
Class lffi3»£A 
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Book 



fogyiiglitS^. 



C^sxHiGicr DEPosm 






THE IMPENDING CRISIS, 



CONDITIONS RESULTING FROM THE CON- 
CENTRATION OF WEALTH IN 
THE UNITED STATES. 



/ 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS 



CONDITIONS RESULTING FROM THE 

CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH 

IN THE UNITED STATES. 



■■I BY 

^ ^^ '4. '^' ' BASIL A. BOUROFF, 

Graduate Student of the University of Chicago. 



publishers, 
Midway Press Committee, 

CHICAGO. 
1900. ^ 



2r^ /-» e^ J? » 



72232 



i-iorary of Co nr , 

I JUL 27 1900 

I Copyright entry 



SECOND COPY, 

Dfe!iverfld to 

OI^DER DIVISION, 



Copyright, 1900, by 
MIDWAY PRESS COMMITTEE. 



PREFACE, 



This is not a novel, nor a work of fiction; it is 
based on the facts of the Eleventh Census and 
other statistical reports, and on the most reliable 
authorities on these subjects. This book repre- 
sents the most essential and fundamental features 
of the nation's situation. It shows the reasons why 
your cities rapidly become the property of a com- 
paratively very few persons; why the American 
farmers lose their ground, and the urban popula- 
tion lose liberty; and why all become absolutely 
dependent upon a few multi-millionaires. It ex- 
poses the conditions in consequence of which the 
whole nation becomes a nation of mere tenants of 
farms and homes, paying rents; and, while the 
wealth increases, the greatest majority of the peo- 
ple come into desperate struggle not for pleasure, 
but for simple existence. 

In order to impart as much knowledge in regard 
to the situation of the nation as possible, it was 
found necessary to supply the readers with a suf- 
ficient comparison of statistical facts, pointing to 
the differences of averages made by different au- 
thorities on the subject. This comparison has also 
been introduced for the purpose of indicating cer- 
tain truths of special value, and for finding the true 

V 



VI 



PREFACE. 



bases of reasonably dealing" with the most vital 
problem of the national existence. This problem 
involving conditions that cause the commonly rec- 
ognized social unrest of the present time is a prob- 
lem which grows in intensity. 

Recognizing the difficulty in solving the prob- 
lem and the danger of the situation, we should 
not wonder, if the very persons who are always 
incHned to make discounts in estabUshed truths, 
will be profoundly surprised to know from the final 
conclusions here presented, that the time of dis- 
counts has passed away, and that it is now too late 
to ignore the facts of so serious significance. 

If this work should come to be regarded as a 
general diagnosis of the diseased situation, we may 
rest assured that there are many thousands of peo- 
ple who will count it their sacred duty to find the 
proper remedy for curing the disease of the na- 
tional organism. For it will be seen that the situ- 
ation is rapidly growing worse every year with 
the increase of population, and there must be an 
end to the disease. Surely, if the increase of the 
national wealth is becoming less than the continual 
net incomes of the private monopolies, trusts and 
combinations, it is not difficult to recognize that 
the situation is already very bad. It is therefore 
desirable that every one should carefully learn the 
situation. THE AUTHOR, 

Chicago, April i, 1900^ 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH IN THE UNITED 
STATES. 

Page. 

Preliminary: opinions and views i 

Conclusions of Mr. G. K. Holmes, U. S. Census Expert, 

illustrated by diagrams and Table 1 5 

Conclusions of Mr. Thos. G. Shearman ii 

Diagrams, Table II, and explanation 12 

Conclusions of Dr. C. B. Spahr 18 

Diagrams, Table III, and explanation 20 

CHAPTER II. 

STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 

Statistics of aggregate wealth 27 

Economic classes of families analysed 28 

Holders of wealth, tenants and mortgagors 32 

Reciprocal comparison of contradictory classes 39 

Comparison of the poor and the rich families 42 

Right table resulting from comparisons 45 

Comparison of families in tables of different authorities: 

averages of family wealth . . ., 47 

Illustrative chart showing worth of individuals 50 

CHAPTER III. 

THE PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 
Fundamental difference in number of resources of the 

propertied and propertyless 53 

Sources of multiply incomes of the wealth owners » , . , , , 54 

vii 



viii CONTENTS. 

(Extent of mechanical forces applied to labor in favor of 
the wealthy) 57 

A propertyless man himself is a source of multiple ex- 
penses in favor of the propertied 6i 

Primogeniture replaced by dividogenesure, the principle 
of dividogenesure defined and explained 70 

CHAPTER IV. 

ABNORMITY OF THE SOCIAL SITUATION. 

Numbers of the people subject to dividogenesure 78 

(Percentage of the homeless population in cities and 

towns and of the landless on farms) 79 

The propertyless a great nation 83 

Bread-winners and others in gainful pursuits 89 

Productivity of the American people superior 93 

The people labor in favor of speculators 95 

(Artificial world a witness for justice and rights) 98 

Yearly net gains of the natural monopolies loi 

Rates of injustice of dividogenesure expressed in daily 
incomes derived from millions of dependent individ- 
uals by the wealthy few 103 

CHAPTER V. 

THE MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 

Loss of rights precedes loss of property no 

Statistics of farm and home families in debt in 

Percentages and numbers of families in debt in the 

United States after 1890: double table 116 

Increase of mortgages on acre-tracts and lots 119 

Amounts of indebtedness and life of mortgage 121 

Per capita debt and average rate percent on the debt. .. . 122 

Annual interest charges on debts combined 126 

Public and other debts in force after 1890 stated 126 

Significance of mortgages: dififerent views 128 

Loss of property by foreclosure of mortgages I35 



CONTENTS. ix 

CHAPTER VI. 

CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH IN MONOPOLIES, 
ETC. 

Increase of the national wealth in seven years 139 

Wages: the doctrine of; artificially kept up; the fall of. . . 141 
Net incomes of the natural and mortgagee monopolies 

from 1891 to 1897 inclusive 145 

Net incomes of monopolizers of rentable houses for the 

same period 146 

Net incomes of monopolies of rentable farm lands for 

the same period 148 

Net incomes of some trusts unascertained 151 

Net incomes of the owners of offices, hotels and other 

rentable properties in the centers of cities 152 

Development of trusts in manufacture and mechanical 

industries; concentration of capital 154 

Net incomes of manufacture and mechanical trades 157 

Net incomes of mining monopolies 161 

Increase of the propertyless population 164 

Grand total of the total-net-incomes of monopolies, 

trusts, and combinations in seven years 169 

Excess of the net incomes over the total increase of the 

national wealth in seven years explained , . 170 

National and local taxes for seven years paid 174 

Increase of the propertyless and that of national wealth 

after 1897 up to 1900 stated 180 

Appendix 187 

Index 191 



CHAPTER I. 

DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH IN THE UNITED 
STATES. 

When a heavy mass of clouds suddenly rises in 
a clear sky, every one thinks that a terrific storm 
is to follow, displaying a great store 
of pent up forces. And many people ^'^tLes ^"^ 
never make a single mistake in pre- 
dicting from so ominous a summer sky what is 
going to take place. Some similar forecasting is 
now going on within the consciousness of the peo- 
ple. For nearly every one more or less clearly 
feels that he is heavily pressed upon by some por- 
tent in the national life. And every one whose 
mental horizon is clear enough and wide enough 
sees, beyond the outward appearance, that some- 
thing dangerous is stored in the nation. It may 
be something so unusually great in its force, some- 
thing so explosive, something so combustible, that 
with the new century it may terribly shake the 
world. 

It was quite recently when the "North Ameri- 
can" of Philadelphia asked the question, 'What 
has the Nineteenth Century in store for Philadel- 
phia?" And by its own admission the replies 
repeiyed were ^mazing. In summing them up^ 

3 



2 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

before spreading them at large before its readers, 
it said: 

^'Substantial business men, whose names are al- 
most household words, solemnly affirm that with 

OPINIONS OF the new century will come revolu- 
BusiNEss tion and bloodshed. Leading law- 

MEN. 

yers say the tendency will be toward 
socialism. Bankers join with labor leaders in fore- 
casting the triumph of the single-tax theory and 
the consequent overthrow of existing social condi- 
tions. That such a tremendous undercurrent of 
dissatisfaction and unrest exists in this city will 
undoubtedly come as a shock to thousands of con- 
servative citizens. The opinions given are not those 
of labor agitators or anarchists. They are the 
careful expressions of men of wealth and of broad 
education. The revolutionary suggestions were 
not shouted upon the street in time of riot and 
excitement, but were given deliberately while the 
speakers sat in their well furnished offices, sur- 
rounded by comforts and evidences of prosper- 
ity.*" So then the Nineteenth Century has stored 
up in the social organism of the nation enough 
material to produce revolution and bloodshed in 
the Twentieth Century. 

And Mr. Louis Post says in 'The PubHc" of 
Chicago: ''Our leisurely friends of Philadelphia, 



* Quoted from 'The Public," Number 69, July 29, 1899. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 3 

who are to be envied, by the way, and not sneered 
at, for being philosophical enough and sensible 
enough to keep so much unwholesome hustle out 
of their Hves — these slow and sober people must 
have been 'startled' by the above 'revelations' of 
the Philadelphia North American, that ancient 
landmark, now in its 128th year.* It was undoubt- 
edly an amazing surprise in view of its age that 
the answer of its readers was, as you see, 'revolu- 
tion and bloodshed.* 

If similar questions were presented to the think- 
ing public of the various cities of the United States, 
we might have thousands of like opnions and all 
of them would be conditioned by sufficient reasons. 

One of the most prominent thinkers of the city 
of Chicagof also quite recently said that "the 
Twentieth Century will bring to us 
the bloodiest revolution that human learned^iwen. 
history ever witnessed." And his 
assertion was not less amazing than was the affirm- 
ation of the substantial business men of Philadel- 
phia. If it were honest and right to expose the 
names of men whose confidential conversations led 
to the same or similar assertions, I alone could 
make a long list of these names. 

They all admit that the nation, as an organism, 
has long been diseased; its nerves have long been 

* Louis Post, ibid. 

t His name cannot be here given. 



4 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

abnormally strained. But, like the friends of Phila- 
delphia, they speak about revolution and blood- 
shed which is but the last and most convulsive 
stage of any nation's serious disease. And it is true 
that, when this stage is reached, it is impossible to 
avoid the most intolerable operation. 

But the amazing feature of such opinions is that 
different men agree in afifirming that revolution 
and bloodshed is almost unavoid- 
UNREST. able; yet different men, as I know, 
assign different causes for such an 
undesirable event.* Some say it must come be- 
cause the population increases and the unemployed 
laborers increase. Others say that the trusts, com- 
binations, and monopolies must ruin the nation. 
Still others say that progress and poverty, being 
very rapid in their diverse directions, must rapidly 
bring the wealthy and the poor into the state of 
cut-throats against each other. And only very 
few men understand that all these causes are but 
secondary, though working to the same horrible 
end. While the real, effective cause for revolution 
and bloodshed, with the nation, is the exceedingly 
unequal distribution of wealth, and its rapid con- 
centration in a very few hands. 

It is this situation that our democratic people 
will not be able to endure, because they are born 



* This work will show the real causes of it and the rapid 
tendency toward it. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 



free, whereas the storing up of wealth in a few hands 
makes them all economic slaves; deprives them of 
the privileges they enjoyed; makes ^^^^^ 
them absolutely dependent upon the think they are 
mercies of the rich, which, if shown ^^^^ "^^• 
to them, they may live; if withheld from them, 
they must starve to death. 

Let us see, then, what it is that the Nineteenth 
Century has stored up, which is to result in such 
a terrific convulsion in the Twentieth Century. 

The following diagrams present the Logical 
Premises from which the "revolution and blood- 
shed," as a conclusion, must inevitably follow, pro- 
vided their action is not checked. 
Distribution of Wealth in the United States.* 

Population: 62,622,250. Wealth: $65,037,091,197. 



m0H 



^^'A 



- mm 



Millionaires .03 ) aa 
Rich 8.97 r.UD 



Middle... 28 



Lower.... 11 



Poor. 



^.91 







!i!i!i'i!i!ii!i!l!ii 



Millionaires.20 



Rich. 



Middle ....20 



Lower. 
Poor . 



.71 



.29 



Axr * ^S?-^''^''P^^'^ of Social Reform, p. 1435. Ed. by Rev. 
Wm. Bhss and published in 1897 by Funk and Wagnalls 
Company, New York and London. 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



"These diagrams showing by percentages the 
population and wealth distribution in the United 
States, according to tables compiled by George K. 
Holmes, U. S. Census Expert on Mortgage Statis- 
tics, are from the Encyclopedia of Social Reform." 

The contents of the above diagrams show on 
the bases of statistics that in 1890 three hundredths 

PERCENTAGES ^^ ^^^ P^^ ^^^^ ^^ *^^ population, 
OF WEALTH AND which are the millionaires, held 20 
per cent of the nation's wealth. 
Eight per cent and ninety-seven hundredths of one 
per cent of the population, which are the rich, held 
51 per cent of the wealth. The middle class, con- 
sisting of 28 per cent of the population, held 20 
per cent of the wealth. The lower class, consisting 
of II per cent of the population, held 4 per cent of 
the wealth. And the poor class, consisting of 52 
per cent of the population, held but 5 per cent of 
the national wealth,"^ as this table shows: 
Table I. 



Percent- 
ages of 
People. 


Population in 
Groups. 


Percent- 
Wealth. 


Aggregates of Wealth 
in Dollars. 


Distribution 

of wealth per 

head 

in dollars. 


00.03 
08.97 
28.00 
11.00 
52.00 


18,786 
5,617,172 

17,534,216 
6,888,432 

32,563,644 


20 

51 

20 

4 

5 


13,007,418,274 

33,168,916,461 

13,007,418,253 

2,601,483,644 

3,251,854,565 


691,867 

59,041 

741 

377 

99 


100.00 


62,622,250 


100 


65,037,091,197 


1,036 



*This 5 per cent includes personal, unproductive property 
of all sorts. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 7 

This illustrative table represents the exact value 
of the diagrams on p. 5. And nothing is more 
interesting in this table than the sad differences in 
the worth of the groups, and especially when their 
respective wealth is divided per every head. The 
right-hand column shows that there are 18,786 
persons whose aggregate wealth, if divided equally 
among them, w^ould give $691,867 to each man, 
woman, and child. And there are 32,563,644 per- 
sons* in the last group, whose wealth, if equally 
divided among them, can give but $99 to every 
person. These two groups present the greatest 
possible extremes of group-poverty and group- 
opulence. 

The other three groups, as their averages clearly 
show, are intermediary between the two extremes. 
And if all the wealth of the nation 
were equally divided among its pop- ^wealtT^ 
ulation, we could have $1,036 to 
every man, woman, and child. This per capita 
wealth indicates that the nation is very rich on the 
whole, but its riches, as you see, belong to a very 
few persons. 

What then is the difference between a rich man 
and a poor man, between a rich woman and a 
poor woman? 

If the 32,563,644 men, women and children had 

_ * Mind that these statements are of one authority only, 
VIZ.: Mr. G. K. Holmes. 



8 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

$100 per capita wealth, then one rich man of the 
first group of the above table, would be worth more 

than 6,918 men of the last group of 
^°MEN.°'^ the same table. A rich man's horse 

often worth more than 10, 20, 30, or 
even more, poor men taken together. A rich 
woman's finger alone worth more than 10 or 20 
poor women taken together, because that finger is 
often embellished with the diamond rings that cost 
thousands of dollars. A complete ladies' dress or a 
costume often amounts to more than $5,000, and 
hence it is worth more than 40 or 50 women taken 
together with their dresses. Such are the differ- 
ences between the rich and the poor people when 
they are valued by the dollar. 

But the dollar differences cause a great many 
other differences between the rich and the poor. 

The poor man is not only poor in 
''^^RiGHTS^^'^'" weahh, but he is poorer still in social 

rights and privileges. And there is 
no possibiHty for the poor to rise up out of his pov- 
erty. For he has no resources of wealth which the 
rich people have; and he has no property of his 
own; for if he is worth but $99, which is really his 
house-scarb,* he has no productive property at 
all; he is then absolutely dependent upon the mercy 
of the wealthy, without which he cannot exist even 

*House-scarb means: all domestic or household property 
that may be carried on from one rentable house to another. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 9 

for six months. He cannot acquire higher educa- 
tion and training, because he is encompassed with 
poverty which furnishes no means for the educa- 
tion that helps men to acquire wealth. Hence, the 
lack of education keeps the poor in poverty; and 
this poverty prevents him from getting the helpful 
education. So that, poverty and ignorance become 
the bitter enemies of the above millions of indi- 
viduals in the modern world of progress. Yet the 
modern poor have a far more potent enemy than 
poverty and ignorance combined, which we shall 
see later on. 

Meanwhile, we will say here, that the rich are 
the masters over the poor in the sphere of law, 
in the sphere of politics, in the club, 
in the theater, in the church, at home ^^ZTmn^^ 
and abroad — everywhere; as if all 
power were given unto them under the heavens 
over the poor. And how many church-ministers 
would not give them the same power and the best 
places in the hereafter? For the very character of 
sermons in our days depends upon the pleasures 
of the rich in many churches, because the ministers 
depend upon the wealthy few more than they de- 
pend on the millions of the poor. While all these 
poor are the rich men's economic slaves, spending 
half of their labor energy in favor of the wealthy. 
That is what the Nineteenth Century has provided 
for the nation. 



10 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

But the above statistical conclusions were by 
many regarded as ''roseate" and ''extremely mod- 
erate conclusions." And it was in 
^^ToStV'^^ consequence of this that Dr. Spahr 
was obliged to reiterate the expres- 
sion: "Since the completion of this study, a vol- 
ume has appeared that must set at rest all question 
as to the extreme moderation of the estimates 
reached."* For it was clear that every new investi- 
gation of the distribution of wealth confirmed the 
fact of a more and more rapid concentration of the 
national wealth in fewer hands than before. And 
it is the question of poverty, that spreads like con- 
tagion, that the Am,erican people have now to deal 
with, in view of a phenomenal increase of the 
national wealth which concentrates in the few 
hands. And it is this question that cannot be set 
at rest while millions grow poorer and poorer and 
the propertyless increase in numbers, as we shall 
soon see. 

The people cannot set this question at rest un- 
til they know the truth of the different statistical 
tables, indicating the nation's situation and des- 
tiny. And we cannot rest until we make a series 
of propositions for the purpose of producing more 
equal distribution of wealth in this country. And 



*Dr. C. B. Spahr, Pres. Distribution of Wealth in the U. 
S. (1896), p. 69; published by Thos. Y. Crowell & Company, 
Boston. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 11 

even then we cannot rest, until our propositions be 
applied to the irrational life of the nation, with the 
purpose of working out justice for the people. 
When we see all this in their actual life, then we 
shall rest, as the people shall be regaining their 
freedom, their property, their resources of income, 
their rights to work and to enjoy the fruits of their 
toil. The intelligent people cannot and must not 
rest before they reach a resting place. They can- 
not always be deceived by the shallow and selfish 
arguments which prove that the national wealth 
increases enormously, — for it so increases only 
with the few and rapidly decreases with the entire 
people. But the time will come when the tens of 
millions will no longer vote for men who deprive 
them of all rights, self-respect and liberty. 

As we shall see later on, the 32,563,644 persons 
of the last group of the table I possessed no real 
wealth at all even at the census in 
1890. For though the diagrams rep- "^vvealth^^ 
resent them as having had $99 worth 
of wealth to every head, yet this wealth was per- 
sonal and not productive. 

STATISTICAL CONCLUSIONS OF MR. SHEARMAN. 

''An estimate of the distribution of wealth in the 
United States was made by Mr. Thomas G. Shear- 
man in the To rum' for 1889, and for January, 1891. 
It was based on careful estimates of the wealth of 



12 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



RESEARCHES OF 
MR. SHEARMAN. 



the very wealthy, a list of which he gave, and esti- 
mates of the division of the remaining wealth of 
the country between the middle class 
and the poor based on assessors' 
returns."* 
''Mr. Shearman came to the conclusion that 1.4 
per cent of the population own 70 per cent of the 
wealth; 9.2 per cent of the population own 12 per 
cent of the wealth; and 89.4 per cent of the popula- 
tion own only 18 per cent of the wealth."! 

In these conclusions, we have a still greater 
twist of facts by wrong handling. Now, to illus- 
trate these conclusions as they stand by another set 
of diagrams, they will be as follows : 



Population; 




62,622,250. 

The wealthy.. 1.4 
Independent.. 9.2 



Wealth: $65,037,091,197. 



The poor and 
dependent... 




1 ' 

''I' l ll'l'l'l' l' 



The wealth 
of the 
wealthy . . . 



}■ .70 



J 
Independent.. .12 



Dependent 
and the poor 



.18 



Conclusions of Unrestrained Averages of 1890. 



*Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1388. 
tibidem, p. 1388. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 



13 



These diagrams indicate by percentages the ex- 
act conclusions of Mr. Shearman in respect to the 
population and the wealth distribu- 
tion in this country. The author averages 
of these conclusions obviously put 
too much salt of his own into his averages; for, by 
parceling out the wealth of a number of the well- 
to-do and rich people, he succeeded in persuading 
his readers, that, in America, the body of tens of 
millions of propertyless people, the paupers and 
the tramps, do not possess, on an average, less than 
$200 worth of wealth for each person, including 
women and children of all ages. Whereas, in re- 
ality, the wealth from which he made the fictitious 
averages, belongs to a very few persons of the 
nation. While an astonishing majority of the peo- 
ple, as we shall see, have no rights whatever to 
this wealth. 

Let us again illustrate the conclusions in a tabu- 
lar way for the sake of definiteness : 

Table 11.* 



Percent, 
of popu- 
lation. 


Population in 
economic groups. 


Percent. 

of 
wealth. 


Aggregates of wealth 
per group in dollars. 


Wealth per 

head 
in dollars. 


1.4 
9.2 

89.4 


876,710 
5,761,242 

55,984,298 


70 
12 

18 


45,525,973,867 

7,804,450,932 

11,706,676,398 


51,928 

1,354 

209 


100.00 


62,622,250 


100 


65,037,091,197 


1,036 



*This table gives you the exact equivalent of diagrams 
found on p. I2. 



14 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

The first glance at this table and a glance at the 
table on page 6 show the reader that Mr. Shearman 
divided the population into three 
TF^VEVEoTL^^^o^^Ps; and Mr. Holmes divided it 
into five groups. The bases of di- 
vision are economic in both tables; but the lines of 
division are very different with the one statistical 
authority and the other. If we examine these lines, 
we shall find that Mr. Holmes' fifth group consists 
of over 32^ million persons who, taken together, 
had been worth a little over 3 billion dollars; so 
that, each person of the group could have about 
$99 worth of wealth, as the average of table I 
shows. The next higher group of the same author, 
which comprises nearly 7 million persons, had, on 
an average, more wealth to each person, than each 
person could have in the fifth group, hence the 
per capita wealth of the fourth group of people 
was $377. While the group still higher up in 
wealth, which consists of little over 17-I million 
persons, and which had over 13 billion dollars' 
worth of wealth, could have $741 to every head, 
that is, if this wealth were equally divided among 
them. The second group of Mr. Holmes' division 
consists of over 5^ million persons, among whom 
the poorest ones had, probably not less than 
$5,000 worth of wealth, as their average worth of 
over $59,000 shows. Such a division of the popu- 
lation into five economic groups, if every family is 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 15 

rightly and honestly valued, presents an immense 
amount of truth to the public judgment.* 

But what Mr. Shearman really did with his esti- 
mates and conclusions is this : Seeing that the 
extent of poverty is appalling, he 
made the division hne in the group of aveI^age.^ 
well-to-do people; he thus made the 
group of the very poor extend so far as to comprise 
nearly 56 million persons; and then, by dividing 
the wealth of the well-to-do persons among all 
these millioiis, he obtained an average of $209 
worth of wealth to every pauper, to every tramp, to 
every man, woman and child,^ — who have had no 
wealth, and have had no rights whatever to the 
wealth they are nominally represented as entitled to. 

Consequently, his distribution of wealth among 
the third group of people is merely on paper, is 
nominal, is showy, and it does not 
correspond to reality with reference ^DlsTRmiTTioN'^ 
to more than 35 milHon persons as 
represented in Mr. Holmes' distribution of this 
wealth. Mr. Shearman might as well follow the 
example of Mr. Carroll D. Wrightf and, by a 
single effort in calculation, divide among all indi- 
viduals the 70 per cent of wealth that belongs to 
his 1.4 per cent of the people. In doing that, he 
might apportion more than $1,000 worth of it to 



* So far, we give honor to Mr. Holmes in advance. 
t One of the best authorities in statistics. 



16 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

every penniless individual, and then might say, 
Why, we are all rich, we are the most civilized and 
righteous people in the world ! But such an effort, 
and such an assertion, however, would not at all 
alter the real situation; no more than Galileo, when 
in view of the danger of death, signing the Jesuit 

verdict in favor of the non-revolution 
^^GAULEo'^° of our planet round the sun, could 

thereby stop the actual revolution of 
the earth; for the earth's progressive motion went 
on, in spite of the ardent desire and policy of the 
Jesuits to make it stand still by a verdict. Nothing 
but an indescribable shock of the earth against an- 
other heavenly body can change its principles of 
motion. 

The same is true of the nation. Once the prin- 
ciple of concentration of wealth is left unimpeded 

in its action, it must work out its end; 
DANGER. it must of living necessity produce 

revolution and bloodshed. And 
neither the extremely moderate statisticians, nor 
the false averages, of even of the meanest falsehood, 
can prevent its action toward such a horrible result. 

''You remember the French revolu- 
'"t^oTromT"' tion?" asked Hon. Jno. S. Crosby 

of his audience in Binghamton,* N. 
Y., and then he said: "In France all the lands 
had come intO' the hands of a few people, the king 

* Reported in Binghamton Independent of Aug. 12, 1899. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 17 

and nobles, and a majority of the people were de- 
pending on them for a living. The time came 
when these down-trodden people rose up and Paris 
streets ran with blood. Your country will have 
the same experience if you keep on fooHng with the 
laws of God. 

''Rome was once the mistress of the whole 
wodd. She lorded it over the other countries. But 
she fell, and Pliny, her historian, lays the cause of 
her downfall to land monopoly."'^^ And so it was 
with ancient Egypt; so it was with ancient Assyria, 
and so it was with the Byzantine Empire, those 
great and powerful nations that perished for similar 
misconduct in relation to themselves. 

Exactly so, this young nation alsO' irrationally 
strides in the way of Rome. The concentration of 
her wealth in a few hands is now 
more rapid than it was before the last '^^^"a^ion"^ 
census. That census brought about 
astonishing conclusions, yet the nation rushes as 
fast as she can to her ruin. And who can locate 
the weight of responsibility for her end? Every 
one seems to think about his selfish interests. Con- 
sequently, nothing has been done in the past tO' 
evade the ruin; nothing but the greatest national 
harm is being done in the present; and no funda- 
mental measure, no rational remedy, no serious 



* "The Public," Chicago, No. 74, Sept., 1899. 



18 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

means appear for delaying it in the future. While 
.««.«.. r,o^.».^,.« the Los^ical Premisesf for revolution 

LOGICAL PRER.11SES ° 

FOR THE YEAR and bloodshed have been estabhshed 
in the nation's life, and their forces 
have been working to that inexorable end. 

Now we are ready to present another conclusion 
that the statisticians of 1890 reached. It deals 
with the numbers of famihes, leaving out the indi- 
vidual inhabitants. 

We have been assured that the U. S. nation in 
1890 consisted of 12,690,152 families, and that each 
family, on an average, consisted of little less than 
5 members, namely : 4.93 members.* The distri- 
bution of the national wealth among families, there- 
fore, was expressed as follows : 

''Less than half the families in America are prop- 

ertyless; nevertheless, seven-eighths of the families 

hold but one-eighth of the national 

"nation^ z£;^a/^/j/' and vice versa. ''While one 

per cent of the families hold more 

(wealth) than the remaining ninety-nine," says Dr. 

C. B. Spahr.l 

At last we have struck in these conclusions a 



t The diagrams and statistical tables supply the life con- 
tents for these premises. 

* The exact statistics of the Eleventh Census, 1890, have 
given the average at about 4.93 members to a family, which 
means that in each 100 families 93 have 5 and 7 have only 4 
members. In 1880 this average was 5.04, and in 1870, 5.09 
members to a family. 

t Ibid., p. 69. — I italicize these conclusions. See Enc. of 
Sec. R., p. 1389. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 19 

piece of more serious reality. ''Less than half the 
families in the United States are propertyless/' 
Here you are! "Less than half." 
Yet even here, we are far from the ^oTREAUif 
fulness of truth. It seems as if the 
statisticians themselves were afraid to reveal the 
full truth to the people. And there are many intelli- 
gent persons who believe that the pure and com- 
plete truth should be known only to God Omnis- 
cient, while His creatures must be content to know 
but particles of truth mixed with falsehood. 

As long, however, as the U. S. nation remains a 
democratic nation, and as long as responsibility for 
its prosperity or distress and disaster 
rests upon a majority of its people, c'fTheTopJe. 
this people ought to know not par- 
ticles, but the whole truth of the conditions of their 
existence. Otherwise the least possible minority 
of the sharks in human form or the wolves in 
sheep's skin, may devour or ruin the greatest bulk 
of the people. 

Let us then illustrate here one of the above con- 
clusions, while leaving the two others for later 
discussion. 

^ "Seven-eighths of the families hold but one- 
eighth of the national wealth," and vice versa, as 
the diagrams on the following page indicate, 
where the 12,690,152 families represent 62,622,250 
individuals as in the preceding diagrams, 



20 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



Population: 12,690,152.* Wealth: $65,037,091,197. 




Poor 
families . 



(» 



Rich 
families. 



These diagrams represent exactly the truth of the 
conclusion : "Seven-eighths of the families of this 
nation held but one-eighth of the national wealth ;* 
or seven-eighths of the nation's wealth was held by 
but one-eighth of the families. 

The table on the next page illustrates some of the 
details of the above conclusion. 

The upper division of that table presents the 

distribution of wealth among the families, where 

the two ''per family" averages indi- 

FAMiLiES. cate a difference in the worth of 

more than 11 -million families that 

held $732 each, and the worth of little over i^- 

milliou families that held $35,875 each. So that, 



* Dr. C. B. Spahr, 'The Present Distribution of Wealth in 
the U. S./' 1895. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 



21 



each family of the latter group was worth as much 
as 49 families of the former. While the general 
average of $5,125 shows that, if the national wealth 
had been equally distributed among all families, 
every one of them would have had this average 
amount as its own. 

Table III. 





Numbers of families 
in groups. 


^3 

OS "a 

a? 


Aggregate wealth 
per group, in dollars. 


Average 

wealth per 

family. 


n 


11,103,883 
1,586,269 




8,129,636,399 

56,907,454,798 


$ 732 
35,875 


i 


12,690,152 


8 
8 


65,037,091,197 


5,125 


'A 
i 


Number of 
individuals. 




Wealth— the same 
in dollars. 


Wealth 
per head. 


54,794,468 

7,827,782 




8,129,636,399 
56,907,454,798 


$ 148 
7,269 


62,622,250 


i 


65,037,091,197 


1,036 



The lower division of the table represents the 
same amounts of national wealth, the same popu- 
lation, only individually considered; 
and both the wealth and the popula- individuals. 
tion were divided into eight parts 
each, in order to carry out the proportions between 
numbers of the individuals and the wealth they 
possessed. The result in this division is that 
7,827,782 individuals have had an average wealth 
of $7,269 each man, woman and child, and 54,- 
794,468 individuals had but $148 worth of wealth 



22 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

to every head.* The difference between the worth 
of one person of the one group, and one person 
of the other group, is $7,121 in favor of the rich 
person. And that, again, one person of the 
weahhy class, on an average, is worth more than 
49 persons of the poor class. 

But the most astounding fact is that we have 
over 54|-million inhabitants of this poverty- 
NUMBERS NEAREST st"<=ken class, and we have only a 
TO THE little more than 7j-million inhabit- 

ants of the wealth-swollen class. So 
that, these 54^-million individuals appear to be 
totally dependent upon the mercies and motions of 
7j-million persons who are steadily growing richer 
and decreasing in numbers, while the poor are 
growing poorer and rapidly increasing in numbers. 
For such has been the growth of economic slavery 
that the above millions have to combat with. 

Besides all this, we have seen the statistical con- 
clusion that, ''Less than half the families in Amer- 
THEPROPERTYLESS ica are propertyless," which certainly 
''^T'ittIVbet^^'^ means, that these propertyless fami- 
TER OFF. Hes must be found included among 
the 54-millions of the poor. So that the present 
average wealth of these millions, which is $148 
per every head, was made of the wealth of the 
upper classes, which average was not at all pos- 

*Whereas the general average of per capita wealth was 
$1,036. 



DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 23 

sessed by the poor. The economic conditions of 
the poor must be still worse than Table III repre- 
sents them. But we shall find this out in the next 
chapter; while the conclusion that, "i per cent 
of the families hold more wealth than the remain- 
ing 99 per cent of them,," nearly corresponds with 
the conclusion of Mr. Shearman, as represented on 
pp. 12 and 13. 



CHAPTER II. 

STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 

In the preceding chapter, we have dealt with 
ready-made conclusions of different statistical 

authorities-, which, by the way of 
"firstIhapter^ analysis, revealed to us, that 32,563,- 

644 persons* of the population had 
on an average $99 worth of wealth, according to 
Mr. G. Holmes; that 55,984,298 personsf had on 
an average $209 worth of wealth, according to Mr. 
Thos. Shearman; and that 54,794,468 personst out 
of 62,622,2^0 inhabitants, with $65,037,091,197 
worth of wealth, had on an average $148 worth of 
wealth apiece, according to Dr. Spahr. 

These differences in conclusions indicate that 
the national wealth is very strongly concentrated 

with a few persons, and that in order 
^hm!d?o'ffew^ ^^ obtain the nominal average of 

$148 worth of wealth to every poor 
person, one has to move the line of division of 
wealth so far up toward the wealthy few as to 
include nearly all the people among the masses of 
the poor. While, without this unfair moving of 
the line, more than 30-millions of the population 
would have no real wealth at all. For $56,907,- 



*Here, p. 6. 
tHere, p. 13. 
IHere. p. 21. 

24 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 25 

454,798 worth of the wealth actually belongs to 
one-eighth of the population, or to 7,827,782 in- 
dividuals, including men, women and children. 
And among these, we are told, "i per cent of the 
population held more wealth than the remaining 
99 per cent held together."* So that the day is 
not far off when these 99 per cent of the people 
shall absolutely depend upon the i per cent of the 
rich and far reaching. 

Regarded as the Logical Premises of the life of 
the nation, this extremely unequal distribution of 
wealth cannot be other than ex- ^^^ situation is 
tremely dans^erous for the existence dangerous for 

, , . . . r 11- THE FUTURE. 

of the nation as it is, for the logic is 
inexorable: 'Whatever you have sown, that shall 
you alsoi reap, is a saying that cannot be mistaken 
either by the wealthy or the poor. The situation 
indicates that this apparently polished nation pre- 
sents only an enormous v/orking mechanism, made 
not of steel and iron, but a m.echanism of wood, 
which may be broken into pieces at any future 
time, in consequence of any insignificant occasion, 
if it continues tO' work heedlessly on with a wrong 
speed against itself. A rational regulation of its 
speed is absolutely necessary, in order to save it 
from an otherwise unavoidable destruction. A 
civilized nation cannot live long without a highly 
intelHgent regulation of all its working principles. 

♦Here, see p. i3, 



26 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

For, to live a national life is not to play a childish 
game. 

Yes, we have examined the above conclusions, 

but we have not realized the entire truth of the 

xo^o,...«-..^...^ situation. For we were told that, 

WORSE THAN 'Lcss than half the famihes in i\mer- 
INDICATED. -^^ ^j.^ propertyless,""^ which clearly 
means that the distribution of wealth among the 
people is much worse than we have a right to sup- 
pose upon the basis of the stated conclusions 
of 1890. As these conclusions differ from each 
other in contents, we have the moral right to re- 
examine the varying statistical tables that testify 
of the same distribution of wealth. And we have 
a right to find the naked truth in the mass of ma- 
terials we have, and to look it straight in the 
face, if we can. 

But before proceeding to compare the main 
tables of statistics, it will be well to show what the 
wealth of the nation in 1890 consisted of. Ac- 
cordingly, the table on the next page represents 
eight items into which the wealth was classified. 
And it represents the summary of all kinds oi 
wealth that was found existing in the United States 
in the year of the nth census. While the next 
table, following it, represents the history of the 
accumulation of wealth, by application of the labor 



*Dr. Spahr, "Present Distribution of Wealth in the United 
States," p. 69.— Enc. of Soc R., p. 1389, 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 



27 



energy of the people upon various resources of 
land. 

STATISTICS O-F WEALTH. 

'The census valuation of real and personal 
property in the United States (Alaska excluded) 
in 1890* was prepared by J. K. Upton," as follows: 
Table of Wealth. 



Real estate with improvements 






thereon 


1 


^39,544,544,333 


Live stock of farms, farm imple- 






ments and machinery 


2 


2,703,015,040 


Mines and quarries, including 






product on hand 


3 


1,291,291,579 


Gold and silver coin and bulhon. 


4 


1,158,774,948 


Machinery of mills and product 






on hand, raw and manufactured 


5 


3,058,593,441 


Railroads and equipments, in- 






cluding street railroads 


6 


8,685,407,323 


Telegraphs, telephones, shipping 






and canals 


i 


701,755,712 


Miscellaneous 


8 


7,893,708,821 




Total (United States) . . 


^65,037,091,197 



/ 


Accumulation of Wealth 


• 


Years. 


Aggregates of wealth. 


Per capita wealth. 


1850 
1860 

1870 
1880 
1890 


$ 7,135,780,228 
16,159,616,068 
30,068,518,507 
43,642,000,000 
65,037,091,197 


$ 308 

514 

780 

870 

l,036f 



*iinc. of Soc. R., p. 1384. 

tC. D. Wright, "Atlantic Monthly," Sept., 1897. 



38 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



The last historic table shows that the accumula- 
tion of wealth by the nation has been phenomenal, 
and equal to the expense of labor 

INCREASE OF , . . i i- i i i 

WEALTH energy which was embodied by the 
PHENOMENAL ^^^^i^ j^to that wealth. And if the 
amount of wealth existing in 1890 had been equally 
distributed among the people, every man, woman 
and child, would have had more than $1,000 of 
it, 01- exactly $1,036 as the nominal per capita dis- 
tribution of it by Mr. Carroll D. Wright indicates. 

Let us, however, see the actual distribution of 
wealth, as it was in 1890: 

The United States, 1890^—1 st Table. 



ESTATES. + 


Number 
(of families). 


Aggregates of 

wealth per class 

in dollars. 


Average 

wealth per 

family. 


The wealthy clas- 
ses, ;^50,000 and 
over , • . . 


125,000 

1,375,000 

5,500,000 
5,500,000 


33,000,000,000 

23,000,000,000 

8,200,000,000 
800,000,000 


264,000 


The well-to-do 
classes, ^50,000 
to ;S5,000 

The middle clas- 
ses, $5,000 to 
;g500 

The poorer clas- 
ses, under $500 


16,000 

1,500 
150 


Totals .... 


12,500,000 


65,000,000,000 


5,200 



^"Encyclopedia of Social Reform." (p. 1388), 1897, by Rev. 
Wm. Bliss. 

tDr. Spahr, "Present Distribution of Wealth in the U. S.," 
p. 69, 1896, who held each family at five members. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 



29 



It is difficult to understand why this important 
table has been published in round numbers almost 
throughout. It is, however, not at all difficult to 
see that it represents an extremely unequal dis- 
tribution of the wealth among the American peo- 
ple. 

And in order to restore the figures of this table 
so as to bring the whole into accord with the last 
census, it is necessary to regard the 
size of each family at 4.93 members, ^^equalized.^^ 
as the census represents them. In 
doing this, it is also necessary to restore the round 
numbers, supplying all omissions in the aggregate 
totals and in the wealth of the groups. Before giv- 
ing a further explanation, then, the restored table 
will appear as follows: 

1st Restored Tabie. 



Economic clagses of 
families. 


Number 
of families. 


Aggregates of 

wealth per class 

in dollars. 


Average 

wealth per 

family. 


The wealthy clas- 
ses, ;^50,000 and 
over 


126,750 

1,394,250 

5,584,576 
5,584,576 


33,000,000,000 

22,676,863,197 

8,522,541,600 
837,686,400 


260,355 

16,264 

1,526 
150 


The well - to - do 
classes, ;^50,000 
to ^5,000 

The middle clas- 
ses, ;g5,000 to 
^500 

The poorer clas- 
ses, under ;S500 


Totals .... 


12,690,152 


65,037,091,197 


5,125 



30 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

Now, this restoring has been made up by bor- 
rowing $323,136,803 from the wealth found in the 
2d group; and again by adding $37,091,197 worth 
of wealth which was omitted in the round numbers 
of the total aggregate of wealth. These two 
amounts, consisting of $360,228,000 in the re- 
stored table, have on the basis of the original aver- 
ages been distributed among the families of the 3d 
and the 4th groups. So that the 3d group of 
families appears to be richer by $322,541,600; 
while the 4th group by $37,686,400; and the 2d 
group appears to be poorer by $323,136,803 worth 
of wealth. Hence, we have made the ist R. table 
represent the distribution of wealth by $360,228,- 
000 more equal than the author of the original 
table has actually found it to exist.* 

On the other hand, in restoring the numbers of 

family-members to. the census average of 4.93, we 

add about 7 members to every 100 

FAMILIES MADE . ' -' 

EQUAL families of five members each, as Dr. 

TO CENSUS. Spahr represents them. This addi- 
tion of 190,152 families to the whole renders the 
average-family and the total number of families in 
the United States exactly as they were given by 
the census in 1890. 

But in restoring this table to the census status, 

*It should be borne in mind that, "Goods, wares, mer- 
chandise, utensils, furniture, cattle, provisions, and every 
other species of personal property, was included among the 
assets" representing wealth. Dr. Spahr, lb., p. 55. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 31 

we do not for a moment disregard its original 
value, as the most reliable work, nor do we think 
of making an argument, or anything of the kind, 
in favor of anybody, upon the ground of the sur- 
face restoration. No, there is a deeper sense and a 
deeper ground in the restored and the next table, 
and we have an abundance of other material for 
our purpose of showing the truth. Meanwhile, 
this restoring of the ist table that had omissions, 
has been necessary for many reasons, and because 
it seemed to many thinkers as probably an ex- 
treme representation, though it was true to the 
facts. For these thinkers desired that the dis- 
tribution of wealth should be more equal than it 
has really been. 

And, further, holding a conservative position, it 
was necessary too to avoid a serious disturbance in 
the original averages of the family wealth found by 
Dr. Spahr, thus making the table comparable with 
another table, which is the most important one, be- 
cause it indicates the tenants of farms and homes 
and the owners of mortgaged farms and homes. 

Furthermore, the restored table may serve as 
a means o^f comparison of its classes of different 
worth with the corresponding classes in the follow- 
ing table, based upon the eleventh census facts. 
Accordingly, the next table represents the families 
of different worth which were classified upon the 
same economic bases as in the table of Dr. Spahr. 



32 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

U. S. 2d Table, 1890.* 



Holders of Wealth. 


Number. 


Value in Dollars. 


Tenants of farms and 
homes 

Owners of mortgaged 
farms and homes worth 
less than $5,000 

Owners of free farms and 
homes worth less than 
^5 000 


7,871,099 
1,483,356 
3,078,077 
1,257,620 


2,837,049,500 

2,614,955,764 

10,946,616,952 

48,600,000,000 


Owners of farms and 
homes worth ;^5,000 




Totalsf 


13,690,152 


64,998,622,216 



We have read on pp. ii and 12 that, when Mr. 
Shearman made his Hst of statistics of wealth dis- 
tribution, ''that his table was based 
'^rYsearch *" ^^ careful estimates of the wealth of 
the very wealthy; while the wealth 
of the poorer classes was estimated on the bases of 
assessors' returns;" just as the table of Dr. Spahr, 
p. 28, which represents the very wealthy families in 
the 1st group, the well-to-do in the 2d, and the 
poor families in the 3d and 4th groups. This 
arrangement and representation of the famiHes 
evidently agrees with that of Mr. Shearman, and 
proves the fact that both distinguished authorities 
used the same or similar methods in studying the 

*Encyclopedia of Social Reform (publ. in 1897), p. 1388. 3 
tThese totals have been summed up by me. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 33 

actual distribution of wealth, and in representing 
their co'uclusions to those that were anxious to 
know of the distribution. 

But the 2d statistical table, on the preceding 
page, was based upon the carefully averaged con- 
clusions of Mr. G. K. Holmes, the U. S. Census 
Expert on Mortgage Statistics in 1890.; 

"Mr. Holmes," as the author of the 2d table 
says, ''follows a method contrary to that of Mr. 
Shearman, and by estimating the wealth of the 
poor, arrives at the wealth of the rich. He finds 
that .03 per cent of the people own 20 per cent 
of the wealth; 8.97 per cent of the people own 51 
per cent of the wealth, and 91 per cent of the 
people own only 29 per cent of the wealth.* 

'The fact that Mr. Holmes is not a partisan 
either of conservatism or radicalism, gives to his 
estimates an unwonted value. As published in the 
Political Science Quarterly," says the Editor of the 
Encyclopedia of Social Reform, "and in the Jour- 
nal of the Royal Statistical Society, these estimates 
have resulted in these four groups of families seen 
in the 2d table, p. 32." 

We agree with Rev. W. Bliss and others in re- 
garding the estimates of Mr. Holmes as exceed- 
ingly valuable, because without them 
we could neither have known the 'Ses' wor°k. 
number of the tenant families, nor 
the number of the mortgagor families, in the 



34 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

United States. And hence, we could not have 
known the seriovisness of the situation in the eco- 
nomic conditions of the nation. While having the 
table based upon his estimates, the reader may, 
at the very slight examination of the first two 
groups of it, reflect and know the great danger 
implied in them for the nation. And it is this 
table that can tell the number of the propertyless 
families in the United States, even witho'Ut regard- 
ing any further material on the subject. 

But the first trouble about this tablef is, that 
the author of it has omitted $38,468,98 1{ worth 
of wealth from the aggregate wealth 
DiFFJCULTY. ^^ ^^^^ group 4, for the sake of round- 
ness in the great numbers, I sup- 
pose. Otherwise it is impossible to admit that the 
omitted wealth did not belong to anyone in 
the United States at the time of his making up the 
table. So that, restoring the $38,468,981 worth 
of wealth to the 4th group, we find its aggregate 
amounting to $48,638,468,981 worth of wealth. 
And it thus begins to correspond with the great 
masses of wealth owned by the first two groups in 
the 1st table, p» 28 or 29. This omission cannot be 
regarded as a serious one; but, to reach a definite 
conclusion, we must restore it. 

The second trouble in the same table, p. 32, is, 



tTable, p. 32, here. 

I^Compare the total wealth of this table with that on p. 27. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 35 

that the total of famiHes in it contains exactly 
1,000,000 families more than the nation consisted 
of in the year .1890. For there were 
12,690,152 families in the United difficulty. 
States, whereas the second table 
represents 13,690,152 of them, an absolutely round 
number having been added to some group of the 
families. As this table has been published since 
1896, it may be that the author of it had a reason 
to add one milHon families to the ist group, be- 
cause, as the population has increased, so the fami- 
lies without property have also greatly increased 
during the seven years since 1890. And he is un- 
doubtedly right in his calculations as to the growth 
of the propertyless. The statistics of 1890, also, 
represented an ample ground for similar calcula- 
tions on the part of anyone who has studied them. 
The estimates of Mr. G. Holmes, however, do 
not warrant the conclusion that there were 7,871,- 
099 family-tenants of farms and 
homes in the United States in 1890. 'Venants.''' 
For, whatever degree of moderation 
might be in his estimates, this number of the prop- 
ertyless families could not have existed at that 
time in the United States. For, if so many prop- 
ertyless families had been in existence ten years 
ago, a thousand presidents at this time might lose 
their heads in view of the national troubles that 
could result from that abnormal situation of so 



36 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



vast an extent. The individuals that now howl 
about an unusual prosperity might be the indirect 
butchers of human flesh before they themselves 
are butchered. No, we drop out the surplus mil- 
ion families from the ist group of the 2d table, 
and the table will be more correct as follows : 



2d Table 


Restored. 




Holders of Wealth. 




No. of Farms. 


Value in Dollars. 


Tenants of farms and 
homes 

Owners of mortgaged 
farms and homes 
worth less than 
^5,000 

Owners of free farms 
and homes worth 
less than ^5,000. . . . 

Owners of farms and 
homes worth ^5,000 
and over 


1 

2 
3 
4 


6,871,099 

1,483,856 

3,078,077 
1,257,620 


2,837,049,500 

2,614,955,764 
10,946,616,952 

48,638,468,981 


Totals 




12,690,152 


65,037,091,197 



The conclusions in the first two groups of fami- 
lies of this table now appear as trustworthy as the 
entire conclusions of Dr. Spahr in 
coNcTsS the ist table, p. 28 or 29; and, that 
the first two groups, made up on the 
basis of Mr. Holmes' estimates, actually surpass 
everything in statistical importance for this coun- 
try, no one will doubt, when he has read this work. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 37 

For the first group represents the tenant-famiUes 
that hire their farms and homes from others, be- 
ing themselves propertyless. And the second 
group represents famihes that are in debt, and that 
are also rapidly becoming propertyless, as we shall 
see in Chapter V. 

The differences between the ist and the 2d 
tables, however, appear very great. The ist table 
shows that the national wealth is 
quite abnormally concentrated in a in'the'^tables. 
comparatively few hands, repre- 
sented by the first two groups. The 2d table shows 
that the same wealth is more equally distributed 
among the families of the last two groups, than is 
true in the ist table. And it is the 2d table which 
was compiled from the estimates that by some men 
were regarded as extremely moderate, and, there- 
fore, inconsistent with the real situation of the 
people. 

It is certainly not dif^cult to misrepresent the 
whole situation even without intending to do any 
wrong to the nation. For the right 
or the wrong representation of reali- uZten?ionTly. 
ties depends very greatly upon the 
handling of the averages in the distribution of 
wealth among the people. The census facts or the 
assessors' returns may be right, as well as the class- 
ifications of these facts or returns. And yet the 
final representations of them may be twisted, either 



38 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

according to the desire of the statisticians or ac- 
cording to the abstract rules of arithmetic. So 
that these rules and desires may be satisfied, but 
the realities may easily be obscured, and even the 
greatest national dangers may be concealed under 
an improper use of the averages. 

Thus, we have seen the average of Mr. Shear- 
man, which, including some of the well-to-do fami- 
lies among millions of the poor, 
BIAS OF WILL. iT^akes these poor appear as if every 
one of them possessed $209, because 
Mr. Shearman's average covered nearly 56-millions 
of individuals.* While Mr. Carroll D. Wright,! 
describing the problem: "Are the rich growing 
richer and the poor poorer?" makes a single aver- 
age on the basis of the entire population. His 
sweeping average actually and correctly makes, not 
only the 56-millions of the poor of Mr. Shearman, 
but every pauper, every tramp, and everyone in 
hundreds of the lunatic and other asylums, worth 
$1,036 of wealth. Whereas, in reality, i per cent of 
the population held more wealth than the remain- 
ing 99, as Dr. Chas. Spahr has proved.! 

Now, something similar has taken 

mSation. Pl^ce i" the 3d group of the 2d table, 

where more than 3-million families 

are represented as the ''owners of free farms and 

homes worth less than $5,000." And, con- 



*Here, p. 13. tAtlantic Monthly, Sept. 1897. 
$See here, p. 18. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 



39 



sequently, the difference between the ist table and 
the 2d table in the wealthy groups appeared. The 
2d table contradicts nearly all statistical authori- 
ties and has been spoken of as based upon extreme- 
ly moderate conclusions. It is, therefore, neces- 
sary to show the degree O'f moderation implied in 
its distribution of weatlh. 

The fact that all families in the United States 
were classified according to their economic worth, 
as families worth $5,000 and over 
and $5,000 and under, gives us the claIiSon. 
best basis for a comparison of the 
two contradictory tables of the great authorities. 

Let us first see the inconsistency in the groups 
of families which represent the middle classes in 
the two tables. 



Reciprocal Comparison. 



Families worth $5,000 
and under. 


Number 


The wealth of 


Aver- 
ages. 


Difference from the 
number below. . . . 




$ 2,424,075,352 




Middle classes of the 
1st R. table* 

Free owners of the 
2d orig. tablet.. .. 


5,584,576 

3,078,077 


8,522,541,600 
10,946,616,952 


1,526 
3,556 


Difference from the 
number above.. . . 


2,506,499 







*This is the restored group of the ist table, p. 29. 
tad group, p. 32 or 36. 



40 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

Now, the restored group of the middle classes 
of the first R. table should be absolutely in favor 

of diminishing the differences in the 
pomis TO truTh. worth of the identical families and in 

their number. Yet the two groups 
reciprocally exclude each other by their opposite 
terms. So that, the comparison shows that the 
greater number of families has much smaller 
amount of the aggregate wealth; and the lesser 
number of families has much larger amount of the 
aggregate wealth; and that the difference in family- 
numbers is greater than 2j-millions in favor of the 
group of the ist table; and the difference in the 
wealth, nearly 2j-billion dollars worth is in favor 
of the group of the 2d table. Hence, the opposite 
terms of the two economically similar groups can 
in no way coincide with one another. 

This being so, it is not difficult to find out the 
true situation as to the actual distribution of 

wealth which ought to have been 
^^H^fcTu^s.^ represented by the 2d table. The 

alleged moderation of this table has 
been brought about by the same influence of 
averages which we have seen in the conclusions of 
Mr. Shearman.* One average of this gentleman 
has covered 89.4 per cent of the population, and 
thus made the wealth of the richest of them to be 
distributed among the millions of the very poor. 

*See Diagrams, p. 12, and Table II, p. 13. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 41 

The 89.4 per cent includes nearly 56-millions of 
individuals, whose aggregate wealth amounts to 
18 per cent of the national wealth, and apportions 
$209 worth of it to every individual. But if you 
exclude only 20 per cent out of the 89.4 per cent 
of this great mass of people, selecting the wealthi- 
est of all for the exclusion, you will thus have 69.4 
per cent of the people left with less than 9 per 
cent of the national wealth. Your average then 
will be altogether different; it will cover masses of 
the poorest people, and every one of them will 
have less than v$99 worth of wealth. 

It is by a similar inclusion of a number of the 
well-to-do families among the group of ''owners 
of free farms and homes" that the 

,,..,. ^ SOME OF THE RICH 

more equal distribution of wealth averaged 
has been obtained in the 2d table. ^''" '"' ''°'"' 
Otherwise, this table could represent a more mel- 
ancholy array of facts than the presentation of 
these facts which appeared in the first table. But, 
however bitter the truth may be, it is ahvays better 
to taste it than to be ignorant of its existence, be- 
cause one falsehood must create thousands of other 
falsehoods, and, accumulated and multiplied into 
a tremendous mass, these falsehoods may lead the 
nation to self-destruction even as many other nations 
were led to it. 

Dividing again all families of the nation into the 
families worth less than $5,000, and families worth 



42 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



over $5,000, we shall now compare these two classes 

of families in both tables upon their common basis. 

And, as this basis presents the very 

THE SAPJIE ^ ' . ... . 

ECONOiviic BASES bottom of statistics, the comparison 

OF THE AUTHORS, therefore cannot fail to show us the 

very naked truth as to the actual distribution of 

wealth which has partly been obscured by the 2d 

table. 

Comparison of the Poor, 



Families worth under $5,000. 


Number of 
families. 


Aggregates of wealth 
in dollars. 


First three groups of the 
2d table^' 


11,432,532 
11,169,152 


16,398,622,216 
9,360,228,000 


Last tv/o groups of the 
1st R. tablet 


Differences from the 2d 
table » .. .. 


263,380 


7,038,394,216 



Comparison of the Rich, 



Families worth $5,000 and over. 


Number of 
families. 


Aggregates of wealth 
in dollars. 


Two first groups of the 
Kt "R tahle-f- 


1,521,000 
1,257,620 


55,676,863,197 
48,638,468,981 


The fourth group of the 
2d restored table^ 


Differences from the 1st 
R. table • 


263,380 


7,038,394,216 



*Compare these families in the 2d restored table, p. 2>^. 
tCompare the same families in the ist restored table, p. 29. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 43 

As you see, the comparison of the families of the 
same worth in the different tables shows that the 
poor classes of the 2d table are lar- 
ger by 263,380 famihes, and richer '^rev^ealed^^ 
by $7,038,394,216 worth of wealth, 
than they are in the first table. On the contrary, 
the comparison of the wealthy classes that consist 
of families worth. $5,000 and over, shows that the 
1st table is larger by 263,380 families, and richer 
by $7,038,394,216 worth of wealth, than the same 
families in the 2d table. Hence, the concentration 
of wealth in the first table is by $7,038,394,216 
worth greater than it is in the 2d table. And it is 
clear that this amount of wealth is closely con- 
nected with the 263,380 families of the well-to-do 
classes. The question, therefore, is. Where could 
Dr. Spahr find so many more families worth $5,000 
and over, than Mr. Holmes has found? 

We know that both these great authorities 
dealt with the same primary facts of statistics, 
though Dr. Spahr dealt with them 
as they appeared in the Surrogate unaIterable. 
Courts, thus raising the value of the 
facts. And we know that these facts or returns 
represent the worth of every family, just at it 
actually was at the timxc of the nth census. Sup- 
posing then that the above families were repre- 
sented as worth $26,723 each, could Dr. Spahr 
make each one of them worth $4,000 of v\^ealth, 



44 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

with the purpose of including them among the mil- 
lions of families worth $5,000 and under in each 
case? And could he thus rob the 263,380 families 
of their ownership of wealth, in order to make the 
distribution of wealth so abnormal as his table 
shows it? No, sir; this is an utter impossibility 
on anyone's part. And Dr. Spahr represented the 
above families among those that were worth 
$5,000 and over in each case, and that is what any- 
one ought to have done in his place. 

While in the case of the second table, the little 
more equal distribution of wealth appeared not 
UNREAL BASIS OF bccause it was actually so, but be- 
""^TRfeSo'"" ^^^^^^ t^^^ ^bove 263,380 families, 
WEALTH. with their $26,723 worth of wealth 
on the average, unintentionally or accidentally, 
were included among the families worth less than 
$5,000. Consequently, their aggregate wealth, 
amounting to $7,038,394,216 worth, has been 
nominally distributed among the group of ''owners 
of free farms and homes worth less than $5,000" 
to every family. This inclusion was as easily per- 
formed a^s was the inclusion of the well-to-do 
among the poor by Mr. Shearman. ;We therefore 
subtract the above families and their wealth from 
the 3d group and add them to the 4th group of 
families worth $5,000 and over, in order to show 
that these families and wealth belonged to another 
class of the people, as follows : 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 45 

2d Right Table. 



Holders of Wealth. 


Number. 


Value in dollars. 


Tenants of farms and 
homes 

Owners of mortgaged 
farms and homes worth 
less than $5,000 

Owners of free farms and 
homes worth less than 
«5 000 


6,871,099 
1,483,356 
2,814,697 
1,521,000 


2,837,049,500 
2,614,955,764 
3 908 222 736 


Owners of farms and 
homes worth ;^5,000 and 
over 


55 676 863 197 






Totals 


12,690,152 


65,037,091,197 



Now this table represents the very essence of 
statistics on the distribution of wealth which was 
worked out by the two contradictory 
authorities. The 4th group of it con- ^Jaluable.^ 
tains the 263,380 families with their 
aggregate wealth, and equals the first two groups 
in the ist R. table, these two and that being made 
of the famihes — each worth $5,000 and over. 

It should be noticed here, that neither the 263,- 
380 families that we have now included in the 
proper group of the table, nor their 
aggregate wealth, had anything to significant. 
do with the groups of mortgagors 
and tenants in the 2d table. These twO' groups of 
families have been separated from the influence 



46 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

of the free owners of wealth, by being debtors and 
tenants, who have a definite significance of their 
own in the statistics. And this is the reason why 
the subtracted famiHes worth $5,000 and over 
could only be lodged in the 3d grcap of families 
worth below $5,000 under its wholesale average. 

It should also be remembered that, though the 
4th group of the last table represents an enormous 

amount of wealth, yet there are hun- 
"^ONLY^Ew"^ dreds of thousands of families in it 

which are worth but few dollars 
over $5,000 worth of wealth. So that, the real 
concentration of that enormous amount of wealth 
remains in the possession of less than half a million 
families, as these facts have been represented by 
Mr. Shearman and the others in the first chapter. 
And nothing can be said against the accuracy of 
the careful estimates of the wealth of the very 
wealthy by Mr. Shearman and the other authori- 
ties. 

In order to have a more definite idea of the 
distribution of wealth, let us compare both tables 
on one page, and remember that if the group 
wealth v/ere equally divided among the group-fam- 
ilies, each family could have such amount of it as 
the averages indicate. And mind that the next two 
tables, being based upon the same census facts, repre- 
sent the results of careful comparison of the original 
ones. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 
The 1st Table as Restored. 



47 



Owners of Wealth. 


Number. 


The wealth of 


Average. 


The poorer classes 








under $500 


5,584,576 


$ 837,686,400 


$ 150 


The middle clas- 








ses $500 to $5,000 


5,584,576 


8,522,541,600 


1,526 


The well - to - do 








classes $5,000 to 








$50,000 


1,394,250 


22,676,863,197 


16,264 


The wealthy clas- 








ses $50,000 and 








over 


126,750 


33,000,000,000 


260,355 


The totals. 


12,690,152 


65,037,091,197 


5,125 



The 2d Table as 


Restored. 




Owners of Wealth. 


Number. 


The wealth of 


Average. 


Tenants of farms 








and homes. .... 


6,871,099 


$ 2,837,049,500 


$ 413 


Owners of mort- 








gaged farms and 








homesworthless 








than $5,000 


1,483,356 


2,614,955,764 


1,762 


Owners of free 






r 


farms and homes 








worth less than 








$5,000 


2,814,697 


3,908,222,736 


1,388 


Owners of farms 








andhomes worth 








$5,000 and over. 


1,521,000 


55,676,863,197 


37,117 


The totals. 


12,690,152 


65,037,091,197 


5,125 



It should be noticed again, that the differences 
in the family averages of the corresponding groups 



48 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

of the two tables, depend on the differences in the 

numbers and in the aggregate wealth of the same 

e:roups of the tables. And these dif- 

AVERAGES OF ^ ^ , , , . 

FAMILIES' WORTH ferences could not be avoided, snice 
DIFFER. ^YiQ two authorities have made a 

different classification of the families of different 
worth. 

But the comparative importance' of the two 
tables consists in the fact, that the last group of the 
I St table shows the extremely ab- 
^" po'or"groups"^ normal concentration of wealth in 
the hands of 126,750 families, which 
possess more wealth that the remaining 12,563,402 
families do, on the one hand. While, on the other 
hand, the first group of the 2d table shows that 
there have been 6,871,099 families without real 
property; and the second group shows, that there 
were 1,483,356 families in debt and in danger of 
losing their properties, and that both these groups 
of families have been in the state of economic slav- 
ery to the wealthy few. But we shall examine 
their conditions of existence later on. 

GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE, AND GERMANY.. 

"The distribution of private property in Great 
Britain and Ireland in 1891," was such that it was 
thepropertyless ^^'^^ "that less than 2 per cent of the 

IN BRITAIN. families of the United Kingdom 
hold about three times as much private prop- 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 49 

erty as all the remainder, and that 93 per cent 
of the people hold less than 8 per cent of the 
accumulated wealth. There remains, therefore, 
nearly 6,000,000 families"^ — i. e., 30,000,000 indi- 
viduals — ''or more than three-fourths of the people 
of Great Britain and Ireland, without any regis- 
tered property whatever. They have indeed their 
household goods, but the total value of these can 
hardly exceed £100,000,000,"'^' which is little over 
$16 to every individual. 

'The ownership of land is an important factor 
in the social condition of a people," says Mayo 
Smith.f And "if we contrast the 

. ^ . DISTRIBUTION OF 

peasant proprietorship system of land in France 
France, with more than 4,500,000 ^^° ^^^^and. 
owners of land, with the landlord system of Eng- 
land, with its 325,000 owners, the social as well as 
the economic influence must be very different"t 
in the two nations. Certainly the French people 
feel and enjoy economic freedom, while the British 
people are pressed down by an economic slavery. 
In fact, the statisticians seem to agree that the 
distribution of wealth, even in Paris, the capital of 
France, and in Berlin, the capital of Germany, is 
proportionally much more equal than it is in the 
nation of Great Britain or In that of the United 
States, although it is natural that the largest 



*Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1389. 
tStatistics and Sociology, p. 201-2. 



50 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

ILLUSTRATIVE CHART. 



Each oiie out ot the 625.362 individ- 
uals has owaed so much wealth as the 
largest block shows 



Each one out of the 6.879.935 
Siidividuals has owned so much of it. 



Each one out of the 13.888,- 
979 individuals has owned 
so much 



lEach one out of the 
7,319.697 individ- 
uals has owned so 
much 



Each one of the 
33.908,277 
Individuals 
SO much 



Groups 1st 2d 3d 4t!i 5tli 

Every block here represents a comparative average wealth 
of one man, woman, or child of the respective groups in the 
2d Corrected Table, p. 51; while the figures above show the 
numbers of individuals owning one block each, as indicated. 



STATISTICS OF WEALTH OWNERS. 



51 



cities, as a rule, have the distribution of wealth 
much worse than the nations behind them. 

While the thirty millions of British people have 
on the average $i6 w^orth of wealth, the American 
people of the same class have somewhat more of 
this kind of wealth than the British, as the last 
table, individually regarded, shows the 
property of every person of the families, 
follows . 

The 2d Corrected Table, 1890. 



average 
It is as 



Holders of Wealth. 


Individuals. 


The wealth of 


Average. 


Tenants of farms 








and homes 


33,908,277 


$2,837,049,500 


$ 83 


Owners of mort- 








gaged farms and 








lomes worthless 








than $5,000 


7,319,697 


2,614,955,764 


357 


Owners of free 








farms and homes 








worth less than 








;^5,000 


13,888,979 


3,908,222,736 


287 


Owners of farms 




and homesworth 








$5,000 to $50,000 


6,879,935 


22,676,863,197 


3,296 


Owners of farms 








and homes worth 








$50,000 and over 


625,362 


33,000,000,000 


52,769 


The totals. 


62,622,250 


65,037,091,197 


1,036 



The average of $83 w^orth of personal property 
in the ist group of individuals here is a little too 
large, because, subtracting the surplus million 



52 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

families from this group,* we have left the wealth 
of it untouched. In any way, this group contains 

27,117,000 individuals having on 
JussTs^S the average $30 worth of prop- 

erty each, according to the last 
group of families in the table of Dr. Spahr.f It 
does not, however, make a great difference on the 
whole, because the group of tenants, since 1890, 
has undoubtedly increased up to 38,837,849 with- 
out having been able to add anything more to its 
aggregate wealth. 

The increase of the propertyless accrues from 
the natural increase of the population, and from 

CAUSES OF THE ^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ mortgaged properties 
INCREASE OF THE by forcclosurc of the mortgages in 

PROPERTYLESS 

Ihe 2d group, and from the immigra- 
tion of the propertyless foreigners! without special 
means; while the people of the 3d group have 
sunk by thousands into debt from having mort- 
gaged their properties; and only about a million 
families of the last two groups have been exceed- 
ingly prosperous, as we shall understand the situ- 
ation later on. 



*Subtraction has been made on p. 36. 

tSee table, p. 29. 

IThe total number of immigrants entered into the United 
States from 1891 to 1897 inclusively was 2,854,834. — The World 
Almanac, 1899, p. 176. 



CHAPTER III, 

PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 

The statistical authorities told us that "Less 
than half the families in the United States are prop- 
ertyless,"* and we desire to know the chances for, 
and resources of, their living; and what it means 
to be a propertied person or tO' be a propertyless 
person upon earth. 

Let us see the clear distinction between the 
state of a property owner and the state of a prop- 
ertyless person; between the condi- conditions of 
tions of life of the former, and the er'tie°d7"d%'rop." 
conditions of life of the latter, and ertyless. 
how both are affected by and related to these 
conditions. 

First of all an owner of property and a prop- 
ertyless person, are, on an average, perfectly equal 
in that they have physical strength, 
and in that they have equal rights to ^^^l strength." 
use or to apply that strength some- 
where upon the wealth of an owner of wealth. 
And here we meet the first difference between 
them : An owner of property has a chance to 
apply, and to spend his strength upon his own 

*Here, p. i8.— Dr. Spahr, "The Present Distribution of 
Wealth in the United States," p. 69. 

53 



54 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

property ; if, for instance, this property is land that 
gives him any kind of returns in exchange for his 

THE ONE HAS, THE ^^^^^ ^"^ ^^'^^' ^^'^^ propcrtylcss pcr- 
OTHER HAS 'no son has neither this chance nor this 
CHANCE. i-ight to toil anywhere, unless he 
pays for the opportunity of using his strength, by 
dividing the results of his labor between himself 
and the owner of wealth who permits him to draw 
some income from the reso'urces of his own prop- 
erty or wealth. So far, the advantage of thie prop- 
ertied person is such that he has twice as much 
right in his strength, and twice as much chance to 
profitably use his personal strength. 

Now, -every one knows that whatever the wealth 
of a nation may be, it is primarily derived from 

land which is the only inexhaustible 
oRiGiroF WEALTH, ^ource of richcs, or, of derived 

wealth. And when a person gets 
into his possession a portion of land, whether it 
will be in a city, town, or in the country, he then 
obtains a number of resources for his life; he 
becomes a propertied man, and he can apply his 
strength, his skill or his intellect upon his own 
property and thus reap the fruits of his labor. 
The land then is the first store of wealth; but it 
almost never yields anything to man, unless he 
labors, works upon it, with a hoe, a plough, a 
scythe or some other implement that aids him to 
draw greater returns from his land. Again, if iron, 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 55 

for instance, is primarily derived from land, then 
when it comes to the forge, where the hammer, the 
anvil and the other tools aid the blacksmith to 
make an ax out of the rough iron, the ax will be 
of a greater value than the material he used for it. 
But what really made the ax is his 
personal strength and the skill that '^'o^F^'wEALm °'' 
were aided by the tools he used. 
These tools with the blacksmith, and those imple- 
ments with the farmer are economically called 
''capital," because they aid tO' draw more wealth 
by the labor of man. It follows, that land is the 
main factor of wealth; that human 

' SKILL SECOND 

energy or labor is the next factor of factor of 
wealth; and that capital, as aiding health. 
labor and land to produce more wealth than they 
can yield without it, is the third factor of wealth. 
Money is not regarded as direct capital here. 

As capital is a very important source of income 
to a propertied man, and as it is perhaps not clear- 
ly understood by all, let me iUustrate this factor of 
wealth by introducing more examples of it. 

Capital from an economic standpoint is that 
wealth which produces farther wealth, or simply 
aids to create farther wealth. A 

CAPITAL THIRD 

needle is capital, because it aids to factor of 
make a shirt that costs more than health. 
the material used for it. A sewing machine is 
capital of more effective kind than the needle used 



56 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

by hand, because it aids to produce rnore wealth 
than the tailor or the seamstress can produce with- 
out it. A lathe is capital, because it 
/TRTmcuL wealth! not Only shapes the round forms of 
any material more accurately than 
the artizan would ever be able to make without it, 
but it greatly saves his time on every piece of the 
work; thus saving time it aids in producing more 
wealth. A factory, as a whole (including the 
building and machinery), is capital, because all 
the machinery, all tools and instruments used in it 
produce farther wealth from the raw materials, and 
serve as sources of income to the owner of this 
property. Under the care of the stock-raiser, cattle 
are capital, because they grow and multiply ; but the 
meat or beef is utility, because it may be unproduc- 
tively consumed.^ Agricultural implements, as well 
as the fertilizers, like guano, phosphates and many 
others are capital, because they increase fertility and 
increase the produce of land, which makes a greater 



*Even the uncultivated land is a great source of income 
to its owner. And if it were not so, the great landowners 
of England and Scotland would not have owned fully 
20,000,000 acres of the U. S. land. But now five of them 
own it, and draw large incomes from it, while remaining at 
home beyond the Atlantic. And the Holland syndicate and 
the German syndicate could not have owned 7,000,000 acres 
of the U. S. land, if it were not a source of incorne, even 
without special application of any labor energy to it. But 
now the former syndicate owns 5,000,000 acres of grazing 
land in Western States; and the latter owns 2,000,000 acres 
of it in various States," as the "Up to Date, Coin's Financial 
School," has indicated, pp. 108-118. 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 57 

income in favor of its owner. A thousand different 
machineries and special instruments might be intro- 
duced here to show that each one of them has been 
invented for the purpose of aiding to create more 
wealth out of less wealth. And that all of them 
and every one, when used by an owner of wealth, 
is a definite source of income and of profit to him, 
because it aids his own skill and energy to obtain 
greater returns in exchange for his labor and 
mind, than he can obtain without it. 

But the most effective factor in aiding to pro- 
duce more wealth and a much greater income for 
an owner of wealth is the energy of„^„„^„,^^^ ^^^^^^ 
steam or any other mechanical force, increase of 
applicable to various forms of labor 
and completely obedient to the bidding of man. 
''Steam power has increased in the United States 
from 3|-millions, in i860, to 17-millions horse 
power in 1895; while in Great Britain and Ireland 
it has increased from 2^- to 13-millions; Germany 
from |- to 7^ millions, and in France from 
I to 5-millions horse-power. The increase of 
this capital has been most manifest in manufac- 
tures," says Dr. Henderson.* But it should be 
remarked at once that no one of the families worth 
below $5,000 could apply these milHons of horse- 
powder of steam force upon their properties. This 
energy has all the time been a profitable source of 

*Chas. R. Henderson, D. D., "Social Elements," p. 144, 



58 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

great income in favor of the families that made the 
wealthiest group in the tables of statistics, where- 
as the others have had but little crumbs of its 
increase of wealth. The mechanical force, as every 
one knows, is in service of the capitalists. 

But when we look into the limits of towns and 
cities, we find millions of rentable properties of all 

possible kinds; and every factory, 
^^iNCowfE^'' every storehouse, every shop and 

every dwelling house there is a sure 
source of income to the propertied man. The very 
sweat-shops, where the working people can not, 
on an average, live longer than 28 years — even 
these dens of poison and pestilence are inexhaust- 
ible sources of income and profit to their owners. 
As to the town and city lots, they are all sources 
of greater or less income tO' the men who own 
them. Whether these lots of land are occupied by 
anything or are remaining waste, makes little dif- 
ference, because as the town population increases, 
their values also increase in proportion as the city 
population and its business increase; the owners 
of properties towards centers of the cities are usu- 
ally bound to be rich out of the resources of rent. 

Even a simple house, somewhere 
'TmNCOME '' abo^^t the marginal line of a city or 

town is usually a source of indirect 
income to its owner, because he and his family 
may have a comfortable shelter in it, without 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 59 

which they would pay the rent for another's house,* 
and would carry on all other expenses of life, just 
as they do in their own house, in which they save the 
rental money for some other purposes of living. 

Now then, whatever property you may think 
of — whether natural or artificial, whether animate 
or inanimate, that a person has possession of — it is 
always wealth, and a source of income in his favor. 
The natural wealth is the land, wherever it may be 
in convenient places, it may always 
provide one or more resources of ^^^by'laboI?!^^'' 
income in exchange for the applica- 
tion and expense of strength or skill of labor upon 
it. The artificial wealth includes all capital, what- 
ever it may be, it is capital, if it can assist the labor 
energy to double, triple or multiple the income 
and profit, drawn from the natural resource to 
which the labor-strength is applied. The rentable 
house or any other building is artificial wealth. 
And it is also a source of income to its owner who, 
by a use of skill and by an application of labor 
energy, can make his source of income give a mul- 
tiple yield, in return for the expense of his personal 
strength upon it. 

Thus, the indirect and direct resources of a prop- 



*Some one may of course prefer to live In another's house, 
as they say, not willing to pay taxes for his own property. 
But a just taxation can never cause this trouble. The abnor- 
mity of taxation is shown here in Chapter VI. 



60 THE lAIPENDING CRISIS. 

ertied person, therefore, are always many and 
complete when he works out the wealth himself. 
COMPLETE AND IN- By Complete I mean this, that what- 
comes'"of1>rop. ^^^^ ^^^ intelligence and strength can 
ERTY OWNERS, draw out of the source they are 
applied to, it is always his and is always to his 
benefit. An incomplete income or yield from a 
source of wealth, to its owner, will be this, that, if 
he hires the energy, or the skill of another person 
to apply upon his property, then his income is 
incomplete, because he has to pay for the hired 
labor energy as well as for hired skill. In this 
way an owner of wealth of any kind may even 
divide the yield and the product of the source of 
income into halves. 

But as long as a person is an owner of wealth, 

an owner of capital, and an owner of physical and 

mental energy, he is a possessor of 

™tyoVlife"' resources; his labor energy and his 

existence are then fully guaranteed 

for himself, his wife, and children by his wealth, 

because wealth or property becomes a direct 

source of income, when he himself labors on it, 

and an indirect, when he rents it to others. A 

propertied man, therefore, is safe forever by the 

resources of his property, which yield incomes and 

profits for sustenance of the highest possible life, 

highest education, freedom, and enjoyment. 

But what about the propertyless man? How 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 61 

many resources, or how many sources of income 
has he for his own Hfe, the Hfe of his wife and chil- 
dren? What sources of income has„.^ ,„^ „„„„^^^„ 

HAS THE PROPERTY- 

he for education, for bread and butter, less any source 
for clothes and dress, for their shel- 
ter and his own? What resources has he for his 
sustenance in this world, when the entire world tends 
rapidly to be the property of a very few persons ? 

He has neither land, nor capital, nor house; he 
has neither natural, nor artificial wealth to serve 
him, and hence, has not a single oneiHEPROPERTYLESS 
of the above described sources of so"rq|^qp|J,ulti. 
income and profit which the Creator ple expense. 
provided for man's enjoyment. On the contrary, 
the propertyless man himself is a source of multiple 
expense; he has but a store of labor energy within 
himself, which store must be supported by its own 
effort, and that too while his life is guaranteed by 
nothing but by his physical strength and natural 
mind. And it is only these two that unite to sup- 
port him who is the single source of the following 
manifold expenses in favor of many owners of 
properties and wealth, who sometimes make enor- 
mous fortunes by the efforts of the propertyless. 

If a propertyless man desires to exist at all in 
the sight of his God in this quasi-civilized world, 
he must spend his life in the following ways: 

I. He must pay from it for a shelter to one 
or ano'ther property owner, when this owner has 



62 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

a rentable house, which house serves as a source of 
income and profit to the owner. So that the tenant 
of his house becomes a permanent resource for the 
owner's well-being, because he cannot avoid paying 
rent to the one or the other. 

2. He must pay for his clothes to another prop- 
erty owner or an owner of wealth, who gets in- 
come and profit from selling the 

CLOTHES^ etc'' goocls, and who gets incomes and 
profits for making and producing 
the goods. And as a consumer, the propertyless 
man is relied upon as a source of income by these 
owners of wealth, and hence, he is a resource of 
their own well-being. He must also pay for 
laundry to another owner of wealth and must be a 
real source of income and profit for him, because 
he too is a propertied man and has many resources 
for life. 

3. He must pay for his board, whether in a 
boarding house or in a restaurant, it makes some dif- 
ference; but by boarding in either 

^^^^i^ufnl^T one or the other, he must be a source 

NOURiSHIVlENT. ' 

of income and profit to servants and 
waiters every day, and to a crowd of owners of 
wealth who are ever ready to draw all from him 
they can. But if he boards in the house he rents, 
and if his wife performs the domestic duties in his 
case, then the expense of his life is reduced through 
this channel in favor of the wife. Nevertheless, he 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 63 

must continue to be a source of income in favor of 
the butcher, the baker and grocer, and some other 
propertied men who derive their profits from him 
at a certain per cent in the way of his nourishment. 

4. The propertyless man is another source of 
expense in favor of the support of the general gov- 
ernment of the nation, a state gov- 
ernment, a county government, and eolSMENTfETC. 
perhaps a municipal one. And he 
pays the taxes in the prices of the goods and 
clothing he wears; in the prices of food and the 
drinks he consumes, — these expenses make him a 
sure source of income to many other owners of 
wealth, and so on. And to this channel of drain 
must be added his expenses for education, for dif- 
ferent asylums, for churches and other institutions; 
expenses for the books and newspapers he reads; 
expenses for the carfare, etc., he cannot avoid; 
expenses for the physicians he is cured by, and the 
drugs his strength is invigorated with, and so on. 
Thus every one of these propertied persons obtains 
his own percentage of income from the resource- 
less man. And certainly there are many other 
channels of expense for him in the society he 
comes into contact with. It is really impossible to 
number here even the unavoidable expenses of the 
propertyless man. 

It is then in the above directions that the physi- 
cal and mental energy must run out of the prop- 



64 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

ertyless person. And of course it runs out in the 

form of currency or the mouey by which he pays 

HIS ENERGY IS ^°^ shelter, for clothing, etc., for ser- 

DRAiNED BY THE viccs and all utilities, to the owners 

PROPERTIED MEN. ^^ ^^^j^j^ ^^^^ jj j,^^ propertykss 

man himself is only a source tO' be drained by 
the Others, and if he has neither land, nor capital, 
nor any other natural or artificial wealth to draw 
an income from, then his very strength is good for 
nothing. For the strength itself can neither be 
eaten nor can he pay with it any one who has 
the right to draw on it. His energy must, there- 
fore, be first exchanged either for money or for 
some other utilities of value which are derived out 
of wealth, out of property that he does not possess. 
How then can this persistently drained source be- 
come filled or supplied again? Where is the 
resource of his own income? Surely he can not 
exist without one at least. And, being property- 
less, he naturally does not have even the single one 
outside of himself. Yet he has to live from with- 
out or he must die of starvation from within. 

Now, the only chance for the propertyless man 

to live is to go again to an owner of wealth, and 

HAVE BUT ^^ ^^^^ some one or another resource 

ONE CHANCE of income from him and to apply 

FOR A PAYMENT. ^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^ .^^ p^^j^^ ^^^ ^^^ p^^_ 

mission. Again paying, paying is the only hope 
for the propertyless man. And this is the most 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 65 

important point after all, because he must pay even 
for the application of his personal energy to all 
natural and artificial resources of wealth, or in- 
come. Has any one understood what it means — 
to pay for an application of labor energy to wealth 
that the merciful Creator provided for man? I am 
sure that the politico-economists do not under- 
stand it. A few of them hit this point, sometimes, 
but unconsciously, without conceiving its signifi- 
cance. 

The propertyless person, then, who Is drained in 
all directions, and who has but one chance to 
restore his expended energy from a single source 
of income — this man again becomes an additional 
source of expense in favor of an owner of wealth, 
an additional source of income and profit to prop- 
ertied men. 

But where, and how, can this unfortunate 
creature of God, this multiple source of income 
and profit for men, further pay and expend his 
strength, for becoming a still further source of 
income in favor of the propertied men? 

This question, after the, four previously ex- 
plained series of drains of the propertyless man, 
demands the next point. 

5. The propertyless man can not even make 
himself the source of income and profit to others 
without paying an exorbitant price for it to^ an 
owner of wealth. If, for instance, he labors for 



6Q THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

wages, his employer and others finally obtain from 
25 to 50 or 75 per cent or even more profit out oi 
the results of his labor. If he works on a farm, 

H,S EXPENSES FOR i" ^ P'^"'' °' °" ^"3^ °*" *«=^'t>^ 

EMPLOYNiENT IN with Capital, or works in making 

ANY SPHERE. -^ i i ^ • r 

capital, he must m any way di- 
vide the results of his work between the owner of 
wealth and himself. His portion is usually paid 
by time in money, as wages, as a salary, or in some 
other way; while the whole result of his work 
remains, and is dispensed by the owner of wealth 
who is profited by him. If the propertyless person 
serves to an owner of wealth as a clerk, a book- 
keeper, salesman, or in any other capacity, he can- 
not serve unless he or she is a profitable source of 
income to the propertied master who gives him the 
chance to supply his ever drained source of mul- 
tiple expenses. If, further, the propertyless man 
leases a farm or any other wealth of a propertied 
person, he has always to divide the results of his 
labor between himself and the owner of wealth. 
Whereas, if the owner of it himself labors on his 
wealth, then, the whole result of his toil must 
remain as a reward to himself. And there is the 
difference : The tenant or the lessee is obliged to 
labor twice as hard as the propertied man in order 
to derive so much income for himself, as the owner 
of wealth can derive by working half as hard ; and 
that is because the owner of property is drawing 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 67 

all income of his labor for himself, while the prop- 
ertyless man is drawing income for himself and for 
the propertied man, to whom the former is a 
source of income by paying rent. If, finally, the 
propertyless man labors upon a rentable source 
of income, and then borrows money for improve- 
ments, in addition to the paying for that source, he 
thereby makes himself a source of income in favor 
of the creditor, by paying per cents for the loan; 
and, consequently, he must divide the results of 
his toil between himself and between two owners 
of wealth. The improvements, being a capital, 
must aid him to produce more wealth than he can 
produce without it; but the high rate of percent- 
age which exists in America must surely ruin the 
debtor, because per cents in favor of lenders of 
money, etc., generally run from 6 to 12 per cent 
per annum; and in some cases the money sharks 
obtain even from 15 to 18 per cent. 

What then are the advantages of the propertied 
person and the disadvantages of the propertyless 
man? 

From the preceding it is clearly seen that both 
men are on an equality merely in the physical 
energy. And the propertied person 
has an absolute advantage for devel- TsTdvan?agk° 
oping his mental energy or skill. We 
have, therefore, to regard their physical energy as 
an equal in both. But, with the propertied man. 



68 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

this energy is surrounded by multiple resources of 
income; so that to whatever resource he applies 
his energy, it always yields him the whole results 
of his labor. An application of capital in his power 
multiplies the yield in his favor. An application 
of the hired labor energy still farther multiplies the 
yield and increases his income. His 

A PROPERTIED IS A -^ 

MAN OF MULTIPLE physical energy, therefore, must be 
INCOMES. regarded as a source of multiple in- 
come even in relation to a small amount of wealth 
or income-bearing property.* On the contrary, 
when there is plenty of employmicnt, the energy of 
A PROPERTYLESS ^^^ propertylcss person is itself a 
IS A MAN OF MUL- sourcc of multiple expense in favor 

TIPLE EXPENSES. r ^i ^- i A J • 

of the propertied men. And agam, 
when there is employment, he is permitted to 
apply his energy but to a single resource of 
income; and when permitted to do so, the prop- 
ertylcss man can only draw about half the income 
that this resource can yield to his energy, while 
the other half of it must go to the multiple in- 
comes of the propertied men who employ him as 
the people call it. Hence, being surrounded with 
the inexhaustible wealth of nature, with innumer- 
able resources of income, the propertylcss man is 
only a semi-sourced mani — a man of semi-sourced 
income. He is a man who is entitled to a portion 

*Land, Capital, Rentables, Salables are income-bearing 
properties. 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 69 

of the yield, for the expense of energy which is 
equal to two or more portions of it. And there is 
nothing more in the whole realm of wealth than a 
semi-income from one source for the man who 
himself is a source of multiple expenses in the 
favor of many owners of wealth. A greater injus- 
tice than this could not be fabricated by mankind 
under the heavens. 

But what about the propertyless, when there is 
no employment at all? Or, when the caprice of 
the propertied is not satisfied by the 
halves of the yields produced by the '^.^^''^^p^^f^^..^ 
labor energy and skill of the prop- 
ertyless people? What, when they demand still 
more impossible efficiency in product from the 
emaciated energy of their victims? The answer is 
clear and but one. These economic slaves, these 
victims of the greatest injustice and absurdity are 
thrown back by thousands into the sphere of 
humiliation under public relief. And who con- 
stitutes this public? Nearly all the same prop- 
ertyless millions, who relieve the others, when they 
themselves are not yet on the point of starvation. 

And who is after all accused? Who is searched? 
W^hose character and history of life is mercilessly 
scrutinized at the bars of charity? 
Again the same propertyless vie- "AfiN^^ERioR!" 
tims, the same economic slaves, 
whose lives have been spent in working for the 



70 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

owners of wealth, owners of property, of fortunes. 
It is certainly not with Japan, nor even civilized 
England, where primogeniture persists to reign, 
and where the hereditary noblemen 
''^justice"'' equally continue to suck the energy 
of the British and Irish people and 
of the peoples of their colonies that we have to deal 
with. "In 1 89 1 Great Britain and Ireland had had 
nearly 6,000,000 propertyless families*;" and they 
have been accustomed for centuries to spend more 
than half of their energy in favor of the lords of 
property, who are the lords of nearly all resources 
of wealth in Britain and in many other parts of the 
world. But we have to deal with the people of 
the United States, whose fathers tried by all means 
to escape the influence of primogeniture, and 
whose children have now reached the same eco- 
nomic condition of slavery, but 
DiviDOGENESURE. uudcr a different title, viz., that of 
dividogenesure.f As its definition 
here shows, the principle of dividogenesure in- 
volves both the individual and class dependence of 



*"Encyclopedia of Social Reform," p. 1389. 

'\ Dividogenesure means: (As a class and as an individual, 
I am the owner of land, of wealth and capital): Divide with 
me your sole results of active energy upon my source of 
wealth, or else you may be sure you have only the right 
to starve from drain by others without this supply. [Latin: 
divido,^W\de, part, separate. Greek: genesis, origin, source, 
creation, origination, production. Latin: ure, (perish) by 
rust, by fire, by cold, v/ither, dry up, or starve to death.] 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 71 

the needy upon the wealthy and applies to the 
entire millions of the group of tenant families, as 
well as to the- group of mortgagor families of the 2d 
table.J For all these families have been dividing 
the sole results of their labor or toil, in one way or 
another, between themselves and their economic 
masters that they wholly or partly depend upon. 
The subsequent chapters, however, will better ex- 
plain the situation of their dependence. 

While here we shall but briefly indicate that 
dividogenesure, as a principle of tacit reality, sepa- 
rates the people into two classes: ist, into indi- 
viduals of multiple expenditure in 
each case, but with a possible semi- classes^ 
income for supplying this expendi- 
ture; and 2d, into individuals of also multiple 
expenditure for living, but at the same time of 
multiple incomes sufficient to leave a considerable 
net profit or balance for their future. This balance 
or profit, in some cases, gradually amounts to mil- 
lions of dollars' v/orth of wealth, remultiplying 
further incomes most rapidly; while the indi- 
viduals of the first class become absolutely depend- 
ent upon the second even for the semi-income 
which may at any time be refused them on account 
of too many individuals in need of resources for 
incomes belonging to the second class. 



iHere, p. 32 or 36. 



72 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

And it further follows, that when the resource- 
less are admitted into the sphere of dividogenesure, 
then their multiple expenditure is 
ONE SPHERE, meagerly supplied. But when they 
are refused admittance into this 
sphere, then their unavoidable fate is starvation or 
falling back into the realm of public relief for the 
unemployed. 

As to their fate under the public relief, Dr. 
Amos G. Warner says : 'The most difficult 
problem in the whole realm of .poor- 
otherspheITe. r^li^^ ^s this of providing for the 
unemployed. England has worked 
at it intermittently from the time of Elizabeth" 
(i 558-1603) up to date V\^ithout success. For there 
were more than 30-millions of individuals without 
property in Great Britain and Ireland, when Dr. 
Warner was writing, and he continued as follows : 
"The most careful investigation made in this 
country regarding enforced idleness was probably 
that conducted by the Massachu- 
Loss OF TIME, sctts Bureau of Labor during the 
depression of 1885. There were 
during that year in Massachusetts 816,470 per- 
sons engaged in gainful occupations; of these 
241,589 were unemployed during part of the year. 
The time lost, if we consider only the principal 
occupation of each individual, was 82,744 years; 
but many persons, when unable to work at their 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 73 

principal occupation, had some subsidiary work. 
Making the proper deductions for the time thus 
put in, the net absolute loss of working-time 
amounted to 78,717.76 years. * * * Aver- 
aged among those who lost a certain amount of 
time, the loss per man was 3.91 months.""^ or near- 
ly four months. 

This description shows the absolute helplessness 
of the resourceless people in the State of Massa- 
chusetts alone, while there were 48 
other States and Territories besides loss of money. 
Massachusetts in this country. In 
all these States and Territories, therefore, not only 
millions of years of working-time must have been 
lost during the depression of 1882 to 1885, but 
millions of dollars of public and private money was 
unproductively spent for the rehef of the property- 
less from starvation, cold and from other distresses. 
And after all, that was a comparatively mild reality. 
For the same Dr. Warner further writes : 

*This present chapter passes from my hand in 
March, 1894, when special relief-work for the un- 
employed is being carried forward 
on a scale never before known or stan^t'factor!'" 
needed in this country. -\ It is there- 
fore not possible to give the results of this 



*pr. Warner, American Charities, pp. 178-9, Dr. T. Ely's 
edition. 
tl italicized his words. 



74 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

emergency work." * >!< * But the relief must 
be given. ''The present chapter is concerned 
especially v/ith the problem of the homeless poor 
as a constant factor in the administration of chari- 
ties."^^ The question of how to deal with the tramp 
is said to be of special urgency in every locality 
in the United States with which I am at all 
acquainted. From Boston to San Francisco, and 
from St. Paul to New Orleans, complaints come 
of a number of tramps, which is alleged to be 
'especially' large in each case."t 

In fact, Dr. Warner's book of more than 400 
pages is one that represents the saddest spectacle 

of human misery on the largest 
™°imQmTY^''' scale. It treats all possible causes 

of the misery, excepting the main, 
and all-powerful, cause of all the minor causes, 
which I have named dividogenesure, because it is 
the sister of primogeniture, the one being as 
iniquitous for millions of families as the other. 

As a universally pernicious principle, divido- 
genesure is always working in behalf of a few 

favorites. It has always been unjust 
""oMNJUsifcE^^^ to the employees, even when those 

favorites commanded an equal num- 
ber of places of employment to the number of the 
employees in a nation, because the latter have 

* I italicized his words. 

t Dr. Warner, ibidem, p. 181. 



PROPERTIED AND PROPERTYLESS PEOPLE. 75 

always been obliged to divide the results of their 
toil at an unjust rate of per cent with the former. 
The injustice of dividogenesure, however, intensi- 
fies as soon as the number of the employees be- 
comes greater than the number of the places of 
employment, and this injustice grows especially 
intense when these employees appear to be the 
propertyless individuals. And when a nation has so 
many propertyless individuals as to outnumber by 
millions the places of employment, then, the great 
injustice of dividogenesure changes into the very 
foundation of iniquity. For its favorites, then, 
make all possible devices, like the blanks with tens 
of scrutinizing questions, and other humiliating 
devices for the purpose of selecting the most 
efficient applicants for employment at the cheapest 
possible rates of payment. Thus, the employed 
ones become harder and harder economic slaves 
of these favorites, while the unemployed are cast 
out of the sphere of the slavery without bread, etc., 
into the sphere of starvation and the public rehef. 
Further, dividogenesure is not a system of ordi- 
nary slavery, where the slaves are dependent upon 
their masters for living and dying. 
It is not the slavery that imposes a iliyiARrs^AVERY." 
moral obligation upon the masters 
in favor of the slaves who are subject to them. No, 
no, dividogenesure has made millions of families 
absolutely dependent on its favorites, but it has 



76 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

removed from these favorites all moral obligations 
in. favor of the modern economic slaves. The mod- 
ern master of hundreds of the slaves can extort the 
last inch of labor energy from each of them, and 
yet can live in perfect peace under the shield of 
dividogenesure without responsibility and with- 
out the slightest remorse of conscience. He does 
not compel any of the slaves to make applications 
for employment, for working out his wealth and 
fortune. But he knows very well that there are 
invisible, omnipotent and omnipresent forces, 
namely: Hunger and thirst, or the 
UNSEEN FORCES, multiple expenditure in every indi- 
vidual case, which mightily push the 
slaves to his commanding mastership. And the 
only duty dividogenesure bids him to perform, is to 
choose the most efficient applicants for the lowest 
pay, as they would seem to be the most profitable 
for himself. As to the rejected ones, it is neither 
his business nor his duty to care whether they live 
or perish by fire, by cold, by disease, wither away 
or starve to death. 



CHAPTER IV. 

ABNORMITY OF THE SOCIAL SITUATION. 

The preceding chapter has shown the differ- 
ences between the conditions of life of the prop- 
ertied and of the propertyless people. ^,^^^^^^^,^3 in 
It has explained the multiple expen- conditions of 
ditures of the resourceless, and how 
they are obliged to labor under the principle of 
dividogenesure without ever being able to appro- 
priate the full results of their labor to themselves. 
The present chapter will reveal the astonishing 
number of the propertyless in the United States, 
and the places w^here they are mostly to be found. 

However, before proceeding to examine the 
investigations about the people without property. 
we must add here, that the property- ^^^ property- 
less are those that occupy houses, or less pay rent or 

1 ,.. ,1 11 . ^1 ARE EXPELLED. 

rooms, or simply little cells m the 
rentable properties of the propertied, paying rent 
for them. They are, therefore, regarded as the 
tenants of homes, and when occupying rentable 
farms, they are regarded as the tenants of farms. 
And as long as they are able to earn and to pay 
the rents on time, they are regarded as good peo- 
ple, good families and respectable persons, because 

77 



78 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

they constitute the real sources of income to the 
owners of the rentable properties. But as soon as 
they cannot find a situation, cannot find employ- 
ment, cannot find work, cannot find a job, cannot 
borrow money, cannot pawn anything, hence can- 
not pay rent at the well defined times, then they 
are gently or ruthlessly kicked out of the rooms, 
and regarded as "no good," as degenerates. 

Expelling them from the tenement houses or 
farms, some gentlemen or lady-proprietors some- 
times even express sympathy or 
THEsrmAiloN sorrow to lose their tenants; and 
sometimes they anticipate further 
sufferings and privations for their unfortunate 
roomers, etc., but cannot help them under the 
existing conditions. The expelled tenant then 
wanders about, suffers privations, humiliations, till 
he falls into prison, or she falls into prostitution, 
and into all the miseries of the world. And it is 
only at the point where these propertyless lose 
their real manhood and womanhood that they 
cease to be the sources of income for the prop- 
ertied. 

Now let us deal with the homeless and landless 
in the statistical accounts, where the tenants and 
mortgagors are described together, but with 
greater details in respect to the mortgagors than 
to the tenants. For the sake of clearness, there- 
fore, I must prominently represent here the tenant 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 79 

families, as the propertyless, and must leave the 
mortgagor families for the next chapter. 

The following census statistics represent only 
percentages of families occupying farms and homes 
in the United States, while I have supplied the 
figures implied in the relative percentages of these 
families. 

STATISTICS OF THE TENANTS. 

"Extra Bulletin No. 98 of the United States 
Census, 1890, says: 

"There are 12,690,152 families in the United 
States, and of these families 52.20 per cent," or 
6,624,259 families, "hire their farms or homes, and 
47.80 per cent own them."* 

"In regard to the families occupying farms the 
conclusion is, that 34.08 per cent," or 1,624,655 
families, "hire, and 6^.g2-\ per cent 
own, the farms cultivated by them." farm families. 
So that "among every 100 farm fam- 
ilies 34 hire their farms," being landless. 

"The corresponding facts for the families occu- 
pying homes are, that 63.10 per 
cent," i. e., 4,999,396 families "hire, home families. 
and 36.901 per cent,"i. e., 2,923,560,7 
families, "own their homes." So that "in every 100 



*Remember that these conclusions are moderate. 
tThese owning families include the mortgagors. 



80 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

home families, on the average, 63 hire their homes, 
and 2)7% own them." 

'There are 420 cities and towns that have a 

population of 8,000 to 100,000, and in these cities 

CITIES ^^^ towns 64.04 per cent of the 

64.004 PER CENT, homc-families hire and 3S.Q6t per 

HIRE -^ ^ r 

cent own their homes." So that in 
these cities and towns, 64 out of every 100 families 
hire their homes, and 36 own them, or as the Bul- 
letin states: ''in 100 home families, on the average, 
are found 64 that hire their homes, and 36J own 
them." 

Besides this, "the cities that have a population 
of 100,000 and over," i. e., cities up to millions, 

LARGE CITIES ^^^^ Philadelphia, Chicago, New 
77.17 PER CENTo York and so on, "number 28, and in 

HIRE- 

these cities 77.17 per cent of the 
home families hire their homes and 22.83$ per cent 
own them." It follows, that in these large and 
very populous cities of the United States more 
than yy families out of every 100 are tenant fami- 
lies or those that hire their homes, and 23$ own 
them. Or, as the Bulletin says : "In these cities 
among 100 home families, on the average, yy hire 
and 23I own their homes." § 

Now then, what this Extra Bulletin reveals to us 
is as follows: 



$_Many of these home-owning families are in debt, and 
their homes serve as securities for it. 
§Enc. of Soc. R., pp. 899-900. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 81 

I. That in 1890 we had 1,624,655 families hir- 
ing* farms. The difference between hiring a farm 
and owning a farm is this, that an ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^ 
owner of a farm reaps all the benefits lies hiring 
of his own farm; whatever amount •'^RWiS. 
of energy he spends upon his farm, he obtains all 
the results of it by himself and for himself, re- 
maining all the time an independent man. A farm 
tenant is just the contrary. He is a dependent 
being and is a subject to dividogenesure. He 
works upon a rentable property and m.ust first of 
all satisfy the rightful owner of the farm. He must 
divide the results of his labor between his master 
and him.self, by paying rent. And in order to be 
equally well off with the farmer that works upon 
his own farm, the tenant must exert almost twice 
as much of labor energy as the owner of a farm. 
But this is impossible. And this Impossibility rests 
upon all the tenants of farms. They are economic 
slaves of their masters, slaves under the principle of 
dividogenesure. If they don't wish to divide the 
sole results of their labor, then they must starve, 
and there is no other alternative for them, because 
they are propertyless and hence resourceless. 

2. That at the same time we had ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^ 
4,999,412 other families that were lies hiring 
hiring not the farms but rentable 
homes of the propertied men. And these nearly 
5-million families were not only the sources of 



82 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

income and profit in favor of the owners of the 
homes, but also the sources of income for the 
employers that permit them to labor. So that a 
farm tenant is a direct* source of income to one 
lord of property; while a home tenant is a directf 
source of income for two owners of wealth. And 
a great injustice hangs on the neck of every one of 
these millions, because they have no property of 
their own. But the principal point is this, that 
neither one of them has the right to expend or 
apply his labor energy anywhere without paying 
for it to those that may not labor at all and live. 

Adding now the two classes of tenant families, 

we have 6,624,259 of them; and regarding their 

numbers individually, we have 32,- 

colimNED 656,808 propertyless persons who 

are in bondage of dividogenesure, 

because they have neither the right to expend 

their strength nor to restore it without paying for 

both to the propertied. 

The question now is, Do these numbers show 
that we had ''less than half the families in the 
United States without property?" J Even without 
examining the numbers of the propertyless in 
cities and towns, the Extra Bulletin proves that 
there were 279,023 more of the propertyless fami- 



*He pays rent. 

tHe pays rent and divides the results of his labor, p. 58-61. 

tSee conclusion, p. 18. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 83 

lies than the half of the entire population. And 

this little more than the half represents 1,345,683 

propertyless individuals who could 

build and could inhabit yet another Targe^cit?.'^ 

one of the largest cities in the world, 

while under the unjust principle of dividogene- 

sure they have neither a farm, nor a lot, nor a 

single house of their own. 

But what do you think about the whole number 
of the propertyless? We had fully 32,656,808 
individuals of them in 1890, accord- 
ing to this Bulletin, and they could ^lLVcities^^ 
likewise build and inhabit 32 great 
cities having in each more than a million of good 
citizens. A million population in one city, as you 
know, constitutes one of the most populous cities 
in the world; and we could have thirty-two such 
cities in the possession of these now propertyless 
people. These millions of people could make one 
of the finest nations on earth with 32 of most 
populous cities which they could erect by their 
labor energy. How is it, then, that they are 
obliged to remain homeless, landless, propertyless, 
resourceless? Have they been lazy to work? Have 
they been incapable of doing anything for them- 
selves? Have they been degenerates? No, no, 
these tens of millions have been working hard, but 
they have been deprived of the results of their labor 
by the unjust principle of dividogenesure that com- 



84 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

pelled them to labor for the few families of the 
wealthy group of the two tables on p. 47, which 
own the results of their labor and toil. 

And do you realize what it means to have 420 
cities and towns with the population of 8,000 to 
100,000 individuals in each? Do you know what 
it means to have nearly seven-tenths of their pop- 
ulation without property, when they cannot exist 
without it? And what it means to 
BY^LABoSs. ^^^^ ^^ cities whose population is 
above 100,000, and which goes up to 
millions in some of them; and yet nearly four- 
fifths of their people are without homes, without 
property, and without any resources of their own? 
And do you know that these very cities (and towns^ 
have almost all been built out of the realized labor 
energy or on account of the results of labor of 
these slaves of dividogenesure? 

And this is not all, for, according to the Bul- 
letin, we had 32,656,808 of the propertyless indi- 
viduals, while the 2d R. table, p. 36, 
^GRE^T^cmEs!" which resulted from the 2d table on 
p. 32, and which was pubHshed in 
1897 — this table authoritatively demands that we 
should add 1,251,469 more propertyless people to 
the number found in the Bulletin. This additional 
number of the propertyless could make yet an- 
other one of the most populous cities in the world. 
And, being added together, these people could 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 85 

inhabit not 2i^ but 33 cities, with the total popu- 
lation of 33,908,277 individuals or nearly 34-mil- 
lions of souls. 

Imagine! The whole nation in 1865 was made 
up of this number of people, whose wealth aggre- 
gated over $24,000,000,000 worth, whole nation 
Now the principle of dividogenesure pRo^JmESS 
required but 25 years to render the 'n ibso. 
number of the propertyless equal to the entire 
nation of 1865. Is it not an astonishing fact that 
while this great number of the prop- gy increasing 
ertyless people orrew up, the national property men 

\ , ^ ^ ,,^ . , , , LOST PROPERTY. 

wealth actually mcreased by the 

worth of about $41,877,475,129? For in i860 the 

total aggregate of it was $16,159,616,068, whereas 

in 1890 it aggregated to $65,037,091,197 worth of 

wealth. 

In view of these contrasting facts, can any one 
say that the 33-miillions of the property-losers v/ere 
idle? or that the phenomenal in- human energy is 
crease of the wealth was produced oV"e1?atoTin 
by the very few owners of it because production. 
they had the most effective capital at their own 
hands? No, sir, the capital itself is dead in every 
respect and form, and not a single piece of it can 
produce anything by itself. But, being effective 
aid, assistant in production, capital only helps the 
living human energy to increase the results O'f its 
labor. And it follows that whatever the increase 



86 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

in production due to mechanical forces or to other 
capital may be, it must be attributed to the activity 
of human energy which manipulates all invented 
forms of capital. And surely the blessings of the 
various inventions consist in the fact that the in- 
ventions can aid the labor energy to produce more 
wealth than it can produce without them. Hence the 
real blessings of the invented capital ought to have 
been preeminently in the fact of its increasing the 
well-being of the millions of laborers in the various 
grades of industry. 

How is it, then, that the wealth of the United 

States nation, from 1865 to 1890, increased by 

. . «.«..« more than 42-billion dollars worth, 

IS ST LOGICALLY ^ 

CORRECT OR whilc the well-being of its producers 
MORALLY RI8HT7 ^^^^^^^ decreased? How is it that 

the tens of millions of the workers not only could 
not obtain the due share of the wealth they in- 
creased, but many millions of them in addition 
lost their own properties? How is it that the great 
blessings of the inventors have been changed into 
great curses against their well-being, because now 
they appeared to be absolutely dependent for life 
on the wealthy few, having nothing of their own? 
No explanations of minor causes can answer these 
questions, but the great injustice of dividogenesure 
explains them. 

But what can the propertyless people do when 
they increase and when all the wealth and capital 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 87 

produced by the people are monopolized by a few 
families, as even the ist and 2d tables, p. 47, show 
the facts? What can the 33,908,277 individuals 
without property do, when they have nothing to 
hope for but labor under the principle of divido- 
genesure for the wealthy few that consist of less 
than a million families in the enlarged nation? 

It is evident that their fate condemns them to 
labor, as slaves, on permission, and tO' satisfy first 
the demands of dividogenesure and afterward take 
for themselves what may be allowed ^^^ ^, ^,^^^ ^_ 

•' THE CLAIMS OF 

from the results of their toil on the dividogemesure 

^ 1 1 r 1 -1 ^1 -11 • i REGARDED FIRST. 

rentable farms, while the millions of 
families which hire homes in the 448 cities and 
towns are still harder slaves of dividogenesure than 
the families that hire their farms. They are harder 
slaves because they are more liable to be freed 
even from the oppression of dividogenesure, and 
liable to remain months and months in the sphere 
of starvation without employment. 

Can there be a greater iniquity in the world 
than the iniquity that proceeds from the abnormal 
system of dividogenesure? 

No ! No nation in human history has seen an 
iniquity that can be compared with the results of 
dividogenesure as they are at pres- usvicogenesure 
ent, for it now deprives men of their is a fountain of 

r V r ^ -1 X ^i. i. ^ J -x GRSAT EVILS. 

fruits of toil to the utmost degree; it 

deprives them of their energy, of their rights, and 



88 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

of their property; it deceives them by the medium 
of exchange of commodities and products; it 
makes them economic slaves of the very few mas- 
ters or throws them out of the region of the slavery 
into the region of resourceless starvation and de- 
generation; it concentrates masses of the people's 
wealth into a few hands, leaving millions of fami- 
lies without income in despair and casts them out 
of the rentable homes; it drags them into the 
courts, throws them into prisons; drives them into 
penitentiaries, fits them for and chases them into 
the lunatic and insane asylums. And not only 
this, but nearly all causes of murders, of parricides, 
of infanticides, etc., and of the suicides perpetrated 
by the people, can indirectly be traced to the ab- 
normal system of dividogenesure, which most 
fundamentally conditions almost all national, so- 
cial and private crimes, because sound life always 
depends upon sound economic basis of a nation. 

The system of dividogenesure, however, is per- 
nicious not only to the tens of millions of the 
IT COMPRISES Pi'opertyless people alone, but it has 
THE PROPERTIED euslavcd milHons of families that 
^ ^' have homes and have other little 
properties not bearing direct incomes for subsist- 
ence. These families therefore are also compelled 
to be in gainful pursuits under the same conditions 
with the landless and homeless. And Mr. Carroll 
D. Wright, onesided and severely criticised, wrote 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 89 

about some of them as the American bread- 
winners, as follows : 

"Bread-winners in 1870 engaged in supporting 
themselves were 12,505,923, or 32.43 per cent" of 
the population. "The bread-winners in 1880 were 
17,392,099, or 34.67 per cent of the total popula- 
tion" of that time. 'The bread-winners in 1890 
were 22,735,661, or 36.31 per cent." By "bread- 
winners" he meant "wage earners, salary receivers 
. . . . or any one who was engaged in gainful 
pursuit," including "proprietors of whatever grade 
or description, and all professional persons."* 

I must here make a diversion to examine this 
author's argument. 

For the purpose of proving that the poor, the 
producers of wealth, were getting better off from 
1870 to 1890 by their gainful pur- 
suits, Mr. Wright has placed in the mr. c. d. wright. 
same class individuals of incompar- 
able description, and, by making averages upon 
equally incomparable basis of their gains, logical- 
ly arrived at the false conclusion that the wages 
in general had risen during that period of time. 
And hence, he added that "the rich are grov/ing 
richer and the poor are getting better off." He 
thus arrived at the same nominal conclusion at 
which Mr. Shearman has arrived in making nearly 
56-minions of individuals appear to be in pos- 

*Mr. Wright, "Atlantic Monthly" for September, 1897. 



90 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

session of $209 each.f And it is exactly in the 
same way Mr. Wright himself made the per capita 
wealth in the United States, as a whole, amount to 
$1,036 for every inhabitant of the nation. The 
rules of arithmetic are accurate in every calcula- 
tion. But the nominal distribution of wealth has 
never made the millions of the people better ofif; 
and it has never altered the fact, that in 1890 we 
had nearly 34-millions of them without property; 
and we had a little over 7-millions of other in- 
dividuals owning more than 55-l-billion dollars 
worth of wealth. J .Whereas, at the same time, 
there were more than 27-millions of individuals 
whose aggregate wealth was only $825-millions, 
which is but $30 to each person.* 

This little diversion from our main thought 
once more testifies that the increase of the 42- 
billion dollars worth of wealth which accrued from 
1865 to 1890 did not in the least raise the wages 
of those producers of the wealth who were com- 
pelled even to lose their own properties. On the 
contrary, while the salaries and incomes of some 
professional persons had decidedly increased, the 
wages in general had fallen, as we shall see later on. 
Consequently, the tens of millions of the creators of 



tSee his conclusions and my explanation of them, here, 
pp. 12, 13. 

^Compare for this the original tables, pp. 28, 32 and 51. 
*See 1st R. table, group ist, p. 47, and as individuals, p. 51. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 91 

that wealth appeared to be all the worse off, as we 
have seen on pp. 85, 86. 

And when Mr. Wright adds "that the transpor- 
tation has been so perfected," during the same 
time, "as to bring to the door of the ,,.^„„„ 

' 1 . . , 1 THEPROPERTYLESS 

poor man and the rich the results of have neither 
industry of far away people" in order °°^^ ~Q« ^^^^o^- 
that they may buy them from different monopol- 
ists; this sentence really sounds like a mockery to 
the 34-milHons of individuals who had in 1890 
neither their own door nor even window, and who 
were absolutely dependent upon chances for a 
semi-income under the oppressive dividogenesure. 

But as to how many people were engaged in the 
gainful pursuits and how many of them were en- 
tirely subject to the system of dividogenesure, we 
can better know from the researches of Prof. Mayo 
Smith. He says as follows : 

"Persons in gainful pursuits, United States 1890, 
by classes of occupations, in ten years of age and 
over, were 47,413,559. Out of them 
24,352,659 yvQve males and 23,060,- prof, mayo smith. 
900 were females." After this state- 
ment he innumerates their respective occupations 
and adds "That 9,013,201 persons were in gainful 
pursuits in agriculture, fisheries and mining, and 
that 8,333,692 of these last are males and 679,509 
are females."* So that out of 62,622,250 inhabit- 

*Mayo Smith, "Statistics and Sociology," pp. 200, 201-2. 



92 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

ants of the country 47,413,559 individuals of 10 
years of age and upwards were engaged in the 
gainful pursuits. 

Now these nearly 47j-millions of persons in 

gainful pursuits could not all be the slaves of 

FAVORITES OF ^ividogenesurc. For some of these 

DiviDOGENEsuRE pcrsons scrvc its favorites for very 

SPECULATE, 1-1 1 . J .1 • 

high salaries and their services are 
well remunerated. Nor could this number include 
many of the favorites of this unjust principle. For 
its real favorites are those that possess extensive 
rights in natural and artificial resources of wealth; 
they are those that earn their enormous incomes 
even in their comfortable beds, by simply speculat- 
ing on and relying upon the energy and productiv- 
ity of the subjects to dividogenesure. And as the 
productivity of the American people is very high, 
it therefore becomes as easy for them to grow very 
wealthy under the favor of dividogenesure as for 
the millions of m.akers of their fortunes to grow 
very poor and emaciated. 

Reviewing then the various occupations of the 
people in the United States as these are repre- 

i,ooo.oooFAMiUEs'^^^^^ ^y ^^^^^^^^ authorities, we 
AND 33,837.849 havc sufBcicnt Tcasou to iudsfe that 

INDIVIDUALS. . ^, o .1 11 

Since the year 1890 there have been 
about 38,837,849 persons who may be regarded as 
positive slaves to dividogenesure on the one hand. 
And there have been about one million families 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 93 

that were more or less profited by their highly 
productive labor and skillful energy on the other 
hand. The above number includes nearly all the 
homeless and landless of the last census, and in- 
cludes about six millions of those who had their 
little homes and other properties of no importance. 

The productivity of these people may be exem- 
plified by the following reports : 

''Mr. Mulhall, in the 'North American Review/ 
for June, 1895, says: 

''An ordinary farm-hand in the United States 
raises as much grain as three in England, four in 
France, five in Germany, or six in 
Austria, which shows what an enor- of°farmers! 
mous waste of labor occurs in 
Europe, because farmers are not possessed of the 
same mechanical appliances as in the United 
States." (Enc. of Soc. Ref. p. 1093.) 

"Mr. Edward Atkinson gives the following 
statements on the industrial productivity of the 
United States." He says: 

"One thousand barrels of flour, the annual ra- 
tion of 1,000 people, can be placed in the city of 
New York from a point 1,700 or , „r.n.«»,o 

^ '' 7 PERSONS 

2,000 miles distant with the exertion serve 1,000 
of human labor equivalent to that of ^'^" ^^^^°* 
only four men, working one year in producing, 
milling and moving the wheat. It can then be 
baked and distributed by the work of three more 



94 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

persons, so that seven persons serve i,ooo with 
bread."* 

*'The average crop of wheat in the United 
States and Canada would give one person in every 
20 of the population of the globe a 
^TnlVm™ b^^^^l of flour in each year, with 
enough tO' spare for seed. The land 
capable of producing wheat is not occupied to any- 
thing like one-twentieth of its extent. We can 
raise grain enough on a small part of territory of 
the United States to feed the world. "f 

"The general conclusion at which I have ar- 
rived is that in the year 1880, the census year, 
when the population of the United 
^rvlAR'^sm St^t^s numbered a little over 50,- 
000,000, the annual product had a 
value of nearly, or quite $10,000,000,000 at points 
of final consumption, including, at market prices, 
that portion which was consumed upon the farm, 
but which was never sold. Omitting that con- 
sumed upon the farm, it was about $9,000,000,- 
000. "I 

''At an average of 200 pounds per head in the 

United States, the largest consumption of iron of 

„«.^ «r,,.»n,^« any nation, we may yet find that the 

ONE OPERATOR -^ ' -^ -^ 

SERVES HUNDREDS equivalent of one man's work for 
WITH GOODS. ^^^ y^^^^ divided between the coal- 



*Mr. E. Atkinson, "The Distribution of Products," p. 15. 

tib., p. 22, 

JEd. Atkinson, ib. p. 27. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 95 

mine, the iron-mine and the iron-furnace, suffices 
for the supply of 500 persons. One operator in 
the cotton factory makes cloth for 250; in the 
woolen factory for 300; one modern cobbler (who 
is anything but a cobbler), working in a boot or 
shoe factory, furnishes 1,000 men or more than 
1,000 women with all the boots and shoes they re- 
quire for a year."t 

These paragraphs sufficiently indicate the gen- 
eral capability of the American people for produc- 
tion under the existing conditions. 

If an Austrian wine-producer or a farmer is six 
times less capable to produce than an American 
farmer; and if this Austrian farmer 
can easily defray the multiple ex- ,g ,^°p^o's's1ble. 
penses of his family and his own out 
of the results of his less capable labor and live com- 
fortably every year, the American farmer ought to 
have five times as much of net profit from the re- 
sults of his capable labor energy as the Austrian 
farmer can spend every year for his living. So 
that, living in the same way as the Austrian, the 
American farmer ought to be in six years fully 
thirty times wealthier than an Austrian farmer of 
an ordinary type. 

How is it then that the wealth of the sturdy 
American farm tenant consists on the average of 
but $360 per family of nearly five members each; 

tEd. Atkinson, ib., pp. ^'j, 78. Also, Enc. of S. R., p. 1093. 



96 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

while an Austrian farmer is incomparably better 
off, being almost always a propertied man? 

And if seven American laborers are able to serve 
1,000 persons with bread and feed themselves every 
year, it is perfectly legitimate, then, that every one 
of them should have a yearly profit of his labor, 
which is equal to the value of bread, yearly con- 
sumed by nearly 143 men. And this yearly profit 
must quickly make a considerable amount of 
wealth in his store. 

How is it then that the millions of American 
producers of bread, each supplying hundreds of 
persons, are obliged to live from 
POVERTY EXISTS, hand to mouth, having neither prop- 
erty nor land, nor any other wealth 
in store for their future? And if their productivity 
testifies that they are able to feed and clothe the 
world, as Mr. Atkinson very reasonably affirms, is 
it not highly important to find out who profits by 
their remarkably efficient labor energy? Or, who 
yearly devours the surplus of their products, leav- 
ing them in poverty? 

Further, the work of one American miner, ''for 
one year, divided between the coal-mine, the iron- 
mine and the iron-furnace," ulti- 

ForpovERTY "^^tely "sufiices for the supply of 500 

persons" with the metaUic goods and 

utilities they consume in a year. ''One operator 

in the cotton factory can provide goods for 250, in 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 97 

the woolen factory for 300, in a boot or shoe fac- 
tory for 1,000 men or more than 1,000 women" — 
one worker in any of these industries, in one year, 
can work out the respective goods these numbers 
of consumers require for a year, thus showing that 
the productivity of every operator is simply phe- 
nomenal. 

How is it then that these very operators who 
can and do supply hundreds and even thousands 
of consumers with different utilities yet poverty 
for living and enjoying, are unable ^ABSByicVcF^ 
to support their own families for six justice, etc. 
months after they cease to be in their exceedingly 
productive employment? And why are nearly all 
of them homeless? Is it the essential and neces- 
sary demand of modern ethics, that the more one 
produces the poorer one must be? Or is it exactly 
the demand of modern justice that millions of 
human beings should only toil and work for others, 
without having the right to work for themselves 
and to partake of the fruits of their own labor? And 
where is the court of justice to be found which can 
vindicate their cause in view of their unusual pro- 
ductivity? 

Many consumers are convinced that these opera- 
tors as well as all other American la- 
borers are always paid what they de- reas^oning. 
serve, though they cannot provide for 
their future. Many other consumers think that 



98 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

they could not be so productive if it were not for 
the highly efficient aid of costly capital under their 
operations. And as a logical inference, these con- 
sumers further think that this capital must be high- 
ly paid for its own productivity. Hence the capital- 
ist must have a lion's share from the results of 
the active energy of every operator with the me- 
chanical forces in production. And, although the 
error of such reasoning is transparent from begin- 
ning to end, yet it seems that justice itself is thus 
often satisfied. 

These reasoners seem to never ask, Whose energy 
is embodied in the capital that the inventors have 

JUSTICE CLAIMS ^^^^ ^2 ^^^^^ blessing for working 
A DEEPER BASIS humanity ? And whose energy has 
realized, or rather materialized, the 
existing inventions after they had been created in 
the minds of the great men? Has all this been 
done by inanimate dollars or money, or by the same 
animate and intelHgent beings whom we now re- 
gard as the mere operators in every sphere of 
human activity? Is it not their energy that flows 
like a river into all things of utility? 

Then they say that the organizers, the managers, 
the superintendents must be paid manifold for 
their superior work and intelligence. All right, 
nobody denies that. 

But will you show me a single article in use, in 
existence, or an object in the process toward use 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 99 

and existence, which does not represent the energy 
of the laborers in need of some of the necessaries 
of mere existence? Show me a brick the whole ar- 
or a stone in its use, an iron-bar, a p'^i^^^ expende"d 
steel-rail, a machine or an engine, human energy. 
a steamer or cable, or whatever you please, 
which has not been washed with the sweat of the 
brow of their makers in need ? Show me that build- 
ing, that palace or mansion, a house or home, 
which does not directly imply, or does not testify 
of the energy of the propertied poor and the home- 
less? 

Or show me that article, a heavy stone in a struc- 
ture, a lump of iron or coal, a coin of silver or gold, 
or show me anything in the world, which should 
prove to have been only stained with the sweat of 
the brow of a mere speculator in motions of values, 
in rentable farms and homes, or in products of the 
workers in need ? I am sure you cannot. 

While as facts I can show that the crystallized 
energy of the homeless, the poor and the landless, 
in possesion of others, floats on the 
rivers, the seas and the oceans; it justly paId^for. 
fills up the land, builds up the towns 
and cities, heats them in winter, lights them at 
night. In possession of others, their energy is sold 
on the markets, and is laid in the stores and the 
banks of others. Further, their energy stands in 
the forms of the plants and the factories working in 

ttrc. 



100 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

speed throughout the country; and it burns in the 
stoves, in the furnace of the various works; it 
steams in the boilers and moves the machines of its 
ov^n making; and it pulls on the cables and the cars 
upon the roads made by its muscle and bone. It 
crystallizes in goods and all objects of use; it then 
moves on in masses upon the lines of rails, and runs 
on from cities to cities, obeying speculators' com- 
mands. So, having been shaped into millions of 
different forms, and having escaped from the work- 
ing hands of its genuine owners, the energy quickly 
changes into more and more durable forms; and 
after several motions, it finally rests in the clean 
hands of the speculators, as if it were their righteous 
net profit and wealth. 

Even this picture indicates the true basis where 
one should look for justice and rights, for losses 
and profits. 

'The profits of the Wall street kings the past 
year were enormous," says Dr. Josiah Strong,* 
about January, 1880. "It is estimated that one of 
them made $30,000,000; another, $15,000,000; 
two, $10,000,000 each; one, $8,000,000; and four, 
from $1,000,000 to $2,000,000 each; making a 
grand total for 10 or 12 estates of about $8o,ooo,~ 
000"* in one year. 

While "Mr. F. C. Waite, special agent of the 



^"Socialism and Christianity," p. 205. Also Enc. of Soc. 
R., p. 289. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 101 



Eleventh Census, in charge of True Wealth, makes 
the following statement as to the gross and net 
earnings of important natural monopolies for the 
census year 1890."* 



Items. 


Gross Earnings. 


Net Earnings. 


Railroads: 






From operation. . . 


$1,051,877,632 


■^ 


Other sources 


126,767,064 




Unreported roads 




> ;^331,373,057 


(about) 


50,000,000 




Express com- 






paniest 


53,000,000 


11,000,000 


Street railways .... 


90,000,000 


28,000,000 


Water transporta- 






tion 


191,000,000 


31,000,000 


Telegraph compan- 






ies 


25,000,000 


7,000,000 


Telephone compan- 






ies 


16,404,583 


5,260,712 


Insurance Com- 


panies: 






Life 


90,000,000 


59,000,000 


Fire, etc 


54,991,613 


19,000,000 


Banks: 






National 


144,614,053 


72,055,564 


All others (esti- 






mated) ......... 


200,000,000 




Artificial Gas 




Companies: 






(Estimated).. ..... 


25,000,000 




Total earnings I 


2,118,654,945 


553,689,333 



*Prof. John R. Commons, "Distribution of Wealth, p. 258. 
Also, see iinc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1102. t^Gross receipts less 
gross disbursements." ITotals made up by me. 



103 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

Now, these totals show what an enormous 
amount of the people's crystallized energy accrues 
to the monopolists in one year, and in every year, 
besides covering all yearly expenses. No wonder, 
then, vv^hy we find that the highly productive peo- 
ple, of which Mr. Atkinson speaks and which could 
even in 1880 put upon the market, ''at final points 
of consumption," the annual surplus of $9,000,- 
000,000 worth of various kinds of products, ap- 
peared in 1890 to be in possession of only about 
$10,000,000,000 worth of aggregate wealth, belong- 
ing to more than 55-millions of individuals. Where- 
as, on the other side, there appeared less than 7^- 
millions of individuals in possession of more than 
$55,000,000,000 worth of wealth.* 

It is certainly understood that all products, while 
reaching the ''points of final consumption," rise in 
their value, on account of the enormous earnings 
derived from them by the speculators in the prod- 
ucts of human energy, while they move these 
products by the cheapest possible labor of millions 
of employees, under the principle of dividogene- 
sure. The rising of their value is, of course, in- 
evitable from beginning to end. Foi; as the raw 
materials, or the products of any kind, continue to 
acquire their consumable state in the hands of the 
operators, more and more energy is being spent 



*Compare the last two groups with the first two of the 
table, p. 28. And compare the same groups of table, p. 51. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 103 

Upon them or added to them. And it is just and 
meet that the persons who thus add their energy 
to the products should be paid for it, whether en- 
gaged in the factory, in the plant, in transporta- 
tion or in the final distribution among consumers. 
Yet what do we find? We find that the 38,837,- 
849* slaves of dividogenesure, who work in the 
whole field of production and dis- 

^ ., . , . THEY LABOR FOR 

triDution, are losmg a great amount less than 
of their energy in favor of about one ^"^ ^^^" 
million* families that employ them for less pay- 
ment than these families finally derive from the 
results of the labor energy of these employees. By 
''less payment" I mean that net profit which is 
called the undue concentration of the producers' 
wealth in the employer's hands; and I mean what 
is absolutely due to the laborers and not what is 
undue. The facts of the undue concentration of 
wealth in the hands of these few families will be 
shown in chapter VI. 

If we now regard one million families of the 
wealthy group of one of the tablesf as the employ- 
ers of the 38,837,849 propertyless 
and the propertied poor, the daily ^",|comes.°^ 
injustice of the million families will 
be expressed in their daily incomes from every in- 
dividual as follows: 



*See this number and families, p. 92. 
tSee tables, p. 36 or 45. 



104 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



Obtaining daily from each individual worker: 



ic. 

2C. 

4c. 

5c. 
6c. 
7c. 
8c. 
9c. 

IOC. 

lie. 

I2C. 
15c. 
20c. 



they derive . . . .$ 388,378.48 

776,756.96 

1,165,135.44 

1,553.513.92 

1,941,892.40 

2,330,270.88 

2,718,649.36 

3,107,027.84 

3,495,406.32 

3,883784.80 

4,272,163.28 

4,660,541.76 

5,825,677.20 

7,767,569.60 



So that, if only 20c is obtained from each of the 
propertyless and the propertied poor in any em- 
ployment whatever, then every one of the million 
families on the average gets daily more than $7 
of the unjust income. And that is simply because 
the resourceless people cannot apply their energy 
anywhere without oppression. But, if the prin- 
ciple of dividogenesure allows these families to 
squeeze out of every one's energy daily 25c, then 
the daily dividend of these families will amount to 
$9,709,462.25, which is nearly $10 to each family 
among the million. And this is one way how the 
rich are growing richer and the poor are growing 
poorer. While the next chapter will show another 
way of getting rich and the poor. 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 105 

No one ought to suppose, however, that the 
million families, variously employing the above 
number of the absolutely dependent ^^^^ j^^gg^g ^^^ 
people, obtain equal shares of the profits are 
unearned profits from the workers in 
the United States. Nor ought one to suppose that 
these workers lose equal amounts of energy in 
favor of the owners of capital, means of transporta- 
tion, or distribution of products, in favor of land- 
lords and houselords, etc. No, some of the workers 
lose more than others, just as some of the fam- 
ilies get much more than others. The net profits of 
the different m.onopolies, p. loi, as represented by 
the census agent, illustrate these differences in the 
gains of several families connected with the mo- 
nopolies. 

But, notwithstanding the differences in the de- 
tailed gains and losses, there cannot be any doubt 
or discrepancy in the general fact, that if "the nat- 
ural" and other* ''monopolies" shall continue to 
earn billions of dollars worth of wealth every year, 
all the nation will soon be absolutely enslaved by 
a very few families of the wealthiest type. The 
economic slavery of the nation then will grow 
harder and harder upon the people absolutely de- 
pendent on the principle of dividogenesure. 

*By the "other" monopolies, I mean some monopolies, 
companies, trusts and combinations which have not been 
mentioned here at all, and many of which deal with rentable 
houses in cities, and so on, 



106 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

For if each one of the 38,837,849 individuals now 

daily loses, on the average, 25c worth of wealth 

produced by his energy, the con- 

iNmvmuALS tinual increase of these dependents 
must bring about a continual in- 
crease in the rates of the daily incomes in favor of 
the wealthy few — at the rates shown on p. 104, 
which shall then go higher up. The concentration 
of wealth will go on, and from the standpoint of 
dividogenesure, these rates wih indicate a con- 
tinual increase or decrease in the unjust concen- 
tration of wealth in a few hands. 

No one must suppose, however, that by the rates 
of dividogenesure we mean only the underrated 
wages and salaries. No, we mean here the losses 
of the people in all stages of productive and dis- 
tributive activity and the final gains of those that 
unjustly profit by this general activity of the peo- 
ple. And I view the nation as a whole with its fu- 
ture. 

If the situation be left, as it is at present, many 
possibilities can unmistakably be predicted for the 
nation's future. 

When the nation is rapidly growing into the 
economic slaves of a few favorites of dividogene- 
sure, there is no use to think about 
POSSIBLE FUTURE, the freedom and political power of 
the enslaved people, because such 
thinking or talking will only be a general mock- 



ABNORMITY OF SOCIAL SITUATION. 107 

flattery against the helpless by the ignorant or dis- 
honest men who may also be slaves over the slaves. 
And this modern dependence of the people will 
certainly be to their own harm. The tens of mil- 
lions of families together shall neither be able to 
support the public schools, colleges, churches, nor 
any other public institutions without the means of 
the wealthy few. Then it will be that the very 
teachers, professors, ministers and every one else 
in the public service will also be in bondage. Then 
it will be that they shall be bound to educate the 
people by so shaping their nervous system as to 
bear even greater economic slavery than any 
savages could tolerate. Then it will be that they 
shall be unable to teach any truth valuable for the 
well-being of the people even if they know it per- 
fectly well.* And then it will be that every one 
shall feel his impotency and littleness in attempting 
to throv/ off the heavy yoke of the few rich fam- 
ilies. 

Besides, we may see here a type of the Venetian 
Republic with all its inherent miseries, on a large 
scale; while the people shall continue 
to groan even as the Venetians did rIpubuc 
under a few prosperous families. But 
the American groaning and misery may undoubt- 

*Prof. George Herron's dismissal from the Iowa College 
is a striking example, foreboding the nation's near future. 
This professor was forbidden b}^ financial necessity to teach 
what is good for the people. — "The Public," Nov. ii, 1899, 



108 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

edly be even greater than theirs, because they were 
oppressed and labored as beasts of burden, but they 
were never compelled to work on a par with the 
modern mechanical forces. And as the misery of 
the American Republic will be g-reater, the oppres- 
sion heavier, and the economic and other forms of 
slavery will be more degrading, it will be necessary 
to have a greater Napoleon Boneparte in order to 
Hberate the future Americans from their oligar- 
chic plutocracy than the one who spoke to the 
Venetians: "I am your liberator; I am not your 
enemy; I am your friend; don't be afraid," and so 
on. 

It is, however, to be hoped that the present 
American fathers will not hesitate to provide some- 
thing better for their children. 



Chicago. "The Public" No. 115, 1900, has now on record 
four other professors similarly dealt with in different col- 
leges on grounds similar to that of Prof. G. Herron. One of 
these four is President Henry Wade Rogers, of the North- 
western University, at Evanston, 111. 



CHAPTER V. 

MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 

It must be borne in mind that in this chapter we 
have to consider only those families of the nation 
which were in possession of real or artificial* prop- 
erty before and after the year 1890. And we have 
especially to consider those of them whose prop- 
erties were mortgaged; and those whose properties 
were to be lost in consequence of the mortgages 
they were encumbered with. While the property- 
less or the tenant families, that were treated in the 
preceding chapter, will now be kept in the back- 
ground of the statistics with which we have to deal. 

When, however, we are through with the statis- 
tics, we may make references to and may even 
make special statements about the tenant families 
treated before; while the prominent position will 
now be given to the mortgagor families, showing 
how they fall from the class of property owners, be- 
come debtors to the owners of greater wealth, lose 
their properties and increase the numbers of the 
propertyless. 

It is important to note here that the loss of the 
rights to property always precedes the actual loss 

*Artificial property again means all things that were cre- 
ated or invented by man in the past or the present. 

109 



110 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

of property itself; and that the fall of the prop- 
ertied into the sphere of dividogenesure, also pre- 
cedes the actual economic slavery of those that be- 
come propertyless. 

The very day in which a propertied person 

mortgages his property he loses his rights for the 

wealth he has owned, because his 

LOSS OF RIGHTS \ 

PRECEDES LOSS property goes from him as a secur- 
OF PROPERTY, ity for thc loau hc makcs. And while 
losing the rights, he takes upon himself the obliga- 
tion to divide the results of his labor between the 
lender and himself, and thus falls under the in- 
fluence of dividogenesure. For, henceforth, he 
spends his active energy in favor of the creditor 
and himself, and is obliged to regard the interests 
of the creditor as of more importance than his 
own. The rate of interest to the creditor must be 
accurately paid so much per cent per annum for 
the loan. Hence, the mortgagor at once appears 
in the position of a tenant of farm or of any other 
property. And it depends on the rate of the per- 
centage he agreed to pay out of the results of his 
labor whether he is better off or worse even than a 
mere tenant. It also depends on the fact whether 
his mortgaged property is a large one or small, and 
whether he has mortgaged one part or the whole 
of his resources of wealth. In any way, a mort- 
gagor, according to the degree of his indebtedness, 
is an economic slave of the owners of greater 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. Ill 

wealth. And he must have a supernatural ability 
and must use an extraordinary effort in order to 
pay his debt or to redeem his property. Otherwise 
his property must pass into the absolute owner- 
ship of the wealthy families that millions of other 
individuals already labor for under the modern type 
of slavery. 

But let us now see the statistical facts and then 
we may better judge of what mortgages signify 
and what they mean to the nation. We shall take 
the other class treated in the same bulletin out of 
which we extracted the 6,624,259 tenant famiHes 
for the preceding chapter.* 

STATISTICS.f 

"Extra Bulletin No. 98 of the United States 
Census, 1890," (of the mortgagor families) *'says:" 

That out of the whole 4,767,1791: farming fam- 
iHes in the United States only "65.92 per cent," or 
3,142,414 families "own the farms 
cultivated by them." And "that ''^Tn debl'^^ 
28.22 per cent," or 886,839 fam.ilies 
out of the 3,142,414 owning ones, "own subject to 
encumbrance," i. e., they are in debt; "and 71.78 
per cent," or 2,255,575 families, "own free of en- 
cumbrance." So that among every 100 farm own- 

*See the same number on p. 79. 

tEnc. of Soc. Reform, p. 899. 

JThis number contains 1,624,765 tenant farming families. 



112 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

ing families 72* own without encumbrance and 2S 
own with encumbrance. 

And the same Bulletin further says : That "on 
the owned farms there are Hensf amounting to 

$1,085,995,960, which is 35.55 per 
PER CENL^ ^^^^ o^ ^^^ value of the encumbered 

farms, and this debt bears interest at 
the average rate of 7.07 per cent," which is more 
than 7 dollars for every $100 borrowed. It is at 
this rate per annum that the farmer's labor energy 
is drained by the wealthy creditors or by the bank- 
ers. "Each owned and encumbered farm on the 
average is v/orth $3,444." This average, of course, 
includes the families far above $3,444 worth and 
far below it — "and" each, on the average, "is sub- 
ject to a debt of $1,224." 

Hence it follows that the principle of divido- 
genesure, in these cases, has a yearly demand that 

every debtor should, on the average, 
INTEREST. pay about $86.53 worth of the results 

of his labor energy to his creditor. 
And it is a question whether even a highly effective 
capital worth $1,224 is really able to increase the 
yearly results of the debtor's labor to the extent of 
$86.53 — I mean an increase in his product abso- 
lutely due to the aid of the borrowed capital on 
which he is to pay this sum as the annual interest 

*Remember that the tenant families are excluded here._ 
tLien means a legal claim on property which must be paid. 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 113 

charge. It is rather probable that the majority of 
the mortgagors pay more than half of this annual 
percentage at the expense of their personal energy, 
even under the condition of the most effective use 
of the borrowed means. For the rate of 7.07 per 
cent is unconscientiously exorbitant and is gen- 
erally abnormal. 

As to the families owning homes, the corre- 
sponding facts are "that 27.70* per cent," or 809,- 
831 famines, out of the 2,923,577 
home-owning families, "own their "°~|n debII"'^^ 
homes with encumbrance, and 72.30 
per cent," or 2,113,746, "own them without en- 
cumbrance." So' that in every 100 home-owning 
families 28 are in debt and ']2 are free of debt. 
"The debt on owned homes aggre- 
gates $1,046,953,603, or 39.77 per 6.23'^plR cLt. 
cent of the value of the encum- 
bered homes, and bears interest at the average rate 
of 6.23 per cent. An average debt of $1,293 en- 
cumbers each home, which has an average value of 
$3,250." This average again includes the family 
homes worth far above and far below the indi- 
cated value. While the homes below this value 
may have greater encumbrances than the others; 
and it is certainly the poorer families that lose their 
properties first, if they attempt to get rich by 



^Remember that the 4,999,396 tenant families are excluded 
here. 



114 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

means of the loans they can obtain at the rate of 
exorbitant per cents. 

If then the average debt of these 809,831 fam- 

ihes is $1,293 and the rate per cent for it is 6.23 per 

cent per annum, every one of them 

'^inTe^re^st^ is, therefore, a subject to the prin- 
ciple of dividogenesure at the rate of 
$80.55 a year. It must, hov^ever, he understood that 
the averages indicate only the general truth, and 
always conceal the particular miseries and distress 
of many millions of the people. And I understand 
that many of these debtors have been in the gain- 
ful pursuits spoken of by Mayo-Smith, and hence 
the dividogenesure presses upon them from twO' 
or even more sides. But it is only the next census 
that will show us the situation these debtors are in. 

Let us now speak about the cities and towns 
with one side of which we have become acquainted 
in the preceding chapter. 

CITIES AND TOWNS. 

''There are 420 cities and towns that have a 

population of 8,000 to 100,000, and in these "cities 

OWNERS OF THE and towns 64.04 per cent," i. e., 

™mL?AT. 1,120,433 "of the home families hire 

AiWONG 414,544 ' 't^OU 

FAiwiLiES. and 35.96 per cent," i. e., 629,146 
families ''own their homes, and of the home- 
owning famihes 34.11 per cent," i. e., 214,602 "own 
with encumbrance and 65.89 per cent," i. e., 414,- 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 115 

544 ''own free of encumbrance. The liens on 
the owned homes are 39.55 per cent of the vahie of 
those subject to lien. Several averages show that 
the rate of interest is 6.29 per cent; value of each 
owned and encumbered home is $3,447; lien on the 
same is $1,363." (See Appendix I.) 

So that these debtors of the 420 towns and cities 
are also subject to the principle of dividogenesure 
at the rate of $85.73 ^^^h per every year, as long 
as the mortgages remain in force and are not fore- 
closed. 

'The cities that have a population of 100,000 
and over" (up to millions) "number 28, and in 
these cities 77.17 per cent," i. e., owners of the 
1,503,911 "of the home famiHes hire large cities 
and 22.83 per cent," i. e., 444,923 276,744 far^sues. 
"own their homes; 37.80 per cent," i. e., 168,179 of 
the latter families have encumbrance and 62.20 
per cent," i. e., 276,744 families are free of en- 
cumbrance. Averages for owned and encum- 
bered homes are: Encumbrance, $2,337; value, 
$5,555; rate of interest, 5.75 per cent. Homes are 
encumbered for 42.07 per cent of their value." This 
is the largest average encumbrance among all en- 
cumbered homes and farms. 

So that every debtor in these 28 large cities (and 
there are 9 of them in every 100) is a subject to 
the principle of dividogenesure at the rate of 
$134.37 each in every year as long as the mort- 



116 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



gage is in force and is not foreclosed. It is after 
the foreclosure that the debtor cannot even redeem 
his mortgaged property; he has then to remain 
propertyless. Let us now sum up the preceding 
conclusions in a tabular way, as follows: 

United States Farms and Homes. 



The Farm-Families. 



Per Cent 



The total of families occupying 
farms 

(1) out of them: The families 
hiring farms 

(2) and the families owning farms. 
Out of the last 65.92 per cent, of 

them are those owning farms 

with encumbrance 

And those owning them free of 
encumbrance 



The Home-Families. 



The total of families occupying 
homes 

(1) out of them: The families 
hiring homes 



36.90 



(2) and the famiHes owning homes. 

Out of the last 86.90 per cent, of 
them are those owning homes 
with encumbrance 

And those owning them free of 

encumbrance i 72 . 30 



34.08 



65.92 

28.22 
71.78 



63.10 



27.70 

■5f 



Total of farm and home families 
with encumbrance 



Number of 



4,767,179 
1,624,765 



8,142,414 

886,839 

2,255,575 



7,922,973 
4,999,396 



2,923,577 



809,831 

2,118,746 



1,696,670 



^These percentages are from the Official Bulletin, No. 98 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 117 

This double table shows clearly enough that 
there were 8,320,831 tenant and mortgagor fam- 
ilies that have been subject to the 
principle of dividogenesure. And omowjESyuRE. 
that these famihes had 41,061,563 in- 
dividual members, including children that have 
now grown up to the same fate of the drain of 
labor energy, under which their unfortunate par- 
ents have been. For all these individuals, of 
course, cannot exist without working in favor of 
the few money lenders and propertied men, because 
the tenants have no resources to apply their energy 
to, and the mortgagors cannot profit themselves by 
the loans of exorbitantly high per cent of interest. 
Hence, they are all drained and all are economic 
slaves of the wealthy few. 

Besides, the necessary life-expenses of every one, 
subject to a strong dividogenesure,* are absolute- 
ly greater than the same expenses of any one in the 
wealthy group. While the incomes of the rich that 
the millions of other individuals and the forces of 
capital work out, cannot even be compared with 
the semi-incomes of the poor that are obliged in 
any way to work for the wealthy, when these are 
disposed to give them a chance to work. 



♦Dividogenesure is the stronger, the larger the per cent 
an employer obtains from the results of the labor of every 
employee; and is the weaker, the smaller the per cent he 
obtains from every one dependent on him for life. 



118 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

Further, is it not an abnormal reality that the 420 
towns and cities in the United States should belong 
CITIES owMED BY to less than 24 per cent of the entire 
^cey™ TOEiR^^ population in them? And is it not 
PEOPLE. Strange that the remaining 76 per 
cent of the inhabitants in these cities and towns 
should live and labor with the purpose of feeding, 
fattening and enriching these 24 per cents of the 
people who are really the ov/ners of these towns 
and cities? And is it not abnormal in the extreme 
to have 28 cities, populated by hundreds of thou- 
sands and by millions of individuals; and that these 
cities, including all kinds of buildings, machines, 
CITIES OWNED BY houscs, ctc, ctc, sliould actually be 
^c^Ey"o1^\^HE!R'' possessed by less than 14 per cent of 
PEOPLE. their population? And that, in addi- 
tion to this extreme abnormity, the remaining 86 per 
cent of their people should be obliged to divide all 
results of active and creative energy with these 
few owners of the great cities? 

But what is inconceivably strange is that this ex- 
tremely abnormal situation should be produced in a 
nation governed by the people's representatives 
chosen by their good will and purpose; and that 
this will and purpose should bring about the results 
of so great injustice and wickedness against this 
people, is only possible on the basis of ignorance, 
neglect of duty and selfishness. 

Let us now have an idea of the progress of de- 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 119 

velopment of the principle of dividogenesure in the 
United States, and of the rapidity with which the 
people fall under its oppressive influence, thus 
gradually becoming propertyless or the absolutely 
helpless economic slaves of those that capture 
them within the extensive nets of that principle. 

''Extra Census Bulletin No. 71 gives the statis- 
tics on mortgages by amounts, length of mortgage, 
rate of interest for the United States from 1880 to 
1889." 

It says: 'That during that time 9,517,747 real 
estate mortgages, stating amount of debt incurred, 
were made in the United States, rep- 
resenting an incurred indebtedness mortgages! 
of $12,094,877,793. The number of 
mortgages made during one year* increased from 
643.143 in 1880 to 1,226,323 in 1889, or 90.88 per 
cent, and the yearly incurred indebtedness in- 
creased from $710,888,504 in 1880 to $1,752,568,- 
274 in 1889, or 146.53 per cent." 

"With regard to mortgages on acre-tracts, the 
number made during 10 years was 4,747,078, rep- 
resenting an incurred indebtedness 
of $4,896,771,112." The increase in acre-tracts. 
making them was as follows : "The 
number of these mortgages made in" the year 

*That is, the rate of making mortgages in 1880th year 
was 643,143, and the yearly rate in 1889th year was 1,226,323 
in one year. 



120 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

*'i88o was 370,984; in 1889, 525,094." So that 
during the years between these ''an increase of 
41.54 per cent" was made; "while the incurred in- 
debtedness increased from $342,566,477 in 1880 to 
$585,729,719 in 1889, an increase of 70.98 per 
cent. 

"The increase was relatively larger in the case 
of mortgages on lots. They numbered 4,770,669 
during the 10 years, and the indebt- 
ON LOTS. edness incurred under them 
amounted to $7,198,106,681. From 
1880 to 1889 the annual number made increased 
from 272,159 to 701,229, an increase of 157.65 per 
cent. During the same time the amount of an- 
nual indebtedness incurred increased from $368,- 
322,027" in the year 1880, "to $1,166,838,555" in 
the year 1889, "an increase of 216.80 per cent."t 

As you see, the yearly increase in the numbers 
ot making new mortgages was astonishingly great 
on all sides. This progress of falling under the in- 
fluence of dividogenesure, falling into debt, indi- 
cates that the people could not avoid becoming 
slaves to the percentages for loans. This progress 
indicates that they were compelled by the general- 
ly abnormal conditions of existence to take the risk 
of losing their properties. And all cities thus grow 
as "New York City," where "but 6 1-3 per cent of 
the families owned their homes"| in 1890. 



tEnc. of Soc. Reform, p. 901. JDr. Spahr, ib. p. ^y. 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 121 

"AMOUNTS :" 

"During the decade 622,855,091 acres were cov- 
ered by 4,758,268 mortgages stating and not stat- 
ing the amount of indebtedness incurred under 
them. The number of acres covered by mortgage 
in 1880 was 42,743,013; in 1889, 70,678,257; an 
increase of 65.36 per cent. In the case of lots 
covered by mortgage the increase was 198.25 per 
cent. The number" thus ''covered by mortgages 
stating and not stating amount of indebtedness in 
the former year being 429,955; in the latter year 
1,282,334. 

''At the end of the decade, January i, 1890, the 
real estate mortgage indebtedness amounted to 
$6,010,670,985," on the whole, "rep- 
resented by 4,777,698 mortgages,"* ^^ "^^^f '^^^ 
which were divided into the mort- 
gages on the acres and the mortgages on the 
lots. 

It was also computed that the average length of 
a mortgage in the United States is longer than 
four and a half years, or exactly 
"4.660 years." The Bulletin calls it ^^or^Jce. 
a "life of a mortgage," which may 
last "as much longer without being paid oft';" 
that is, a mortgage may last as long as the creditor 
gets his rate of interest, or as long as his increasing 

*A11 expressions under the inverted commas ?ire from Bul- 
letin, 



122 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

interest is secure in the whole value of the mort- 
gaged property. Otherwise a mortgage is fore- 
closed. 

But what is specially important for us is whether 
the mortgagors are able to extinguish their debt 
with the same rapidity with which it was incurred 
by them? If they are able to pay off their debts 
at the proper times, then mortgaging of property 
would at least appear uninjurious to their well 
being, though it could not be regarded as profit- 
able to them. 

The same "Bulletin No. 71," however, states 

that, ''since mortgages in force were made, 12.68 per 

„„,„. . cent of the orisfinal amount of in- 

ORlGiNAL DEBT ^ 

PAID: 12.68 PER dcbtedncss incurred under them has 
^^'^^' been extinguished by partial pay- 

ments." Now, it was time to extinguish all the 
original amount on mortgages in force. Yet 87.32 
per cent of the original indebtedness could not be 
paid off by the debtors. And this is a sign of the 

omGiNAL LOSS OF "^^^^ forcibk argument, showing 
PROPERTY: 87.32 that the greatest majority of the 

PER CE?JT. ^ 11 ^ 1 

mortgagors have been on the way 
to ruin, and on the way of losing their properties. 
It is thus the millions of tenants appeared in 1890. 

THE PER CAPITA DEBT. 

Instead of being paid off at proper times, the 
mortgage debt was accumulating so far that if it 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 123 

were divided among the entire population in 1890, 
every man, woman and child would have been in 
debt of $96. Just as the Bulletin 
says that ''the mortgage debt per ''^^''smES^ ^^ 
capita in the United States is $96; 
the three largest state averages (omitting the Dis- 
trict of Columbia) are $268 in New York, $206 in 
Colorado, and $200 in California. The smaller ones 
are found in the south and the Rocky Mountain 
region/'* Such is the per capita debt in these 
three States. 

"In 41 States 28.86 per cent of the taxed acres 
are covered by mortgages in force. The largest 
proportion of mortgaged acres is in Kansas, where 
60.32 per cent of the total number of taxed acres 
are mortgaged. Nebraska stands next, with 54.73 
per cent; South Dakota third, with 51.76 per cent.* 
'Tn the five States, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, 
Nebraska, and South Carolina, 23.99 per cent of 
the taxed lots are covered by mortgages in force,"* 
and so on in the other States. But the most im- 
portant fact is the annual interest the people have 
to pay to the wealthy few for their loans. 

AVERAGE RATE PER CENT ON THE 
DEBT. 

'The average rate for all mortgages in the 
United States is 6.60 per cent. For mortgages on 

*Bulletin No. 71, Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 901. 



3 24 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

acres/' the average is ''7.36 per cent; for mort- 

u. s. RATE gsg^s on lots, 6.16 per cent. These 

PER CENT. rates make the annual interest charge 

on the existing real estate mortgage in the United 

States amount to $397,442792."! 

Now Vv^e have reached the principle point in 
these statistics. Imagine that the families in debt 
are annually charged with the rate 
charge! ^^ interest amounting to $397,442,- 
792 vv^orth of the results of their la- 
bor, and that the group of creditors get this amount 
of wealth yearly without work. And think that, 
if the average life of a mortgage is even 4J years 
long, these families have to pay $1,788,492,564 
worth of wealth produced by their energy during 
this time. But we were told that the average 
length of a mortgage life continues "as much 
longer without being paid off," that is, it lasts 
nearly 10 years, and these families have, therefore, 
to pay nearly $4,000,000,000 worth of the wealth 
produced by them during this time. That is how 
the debtors are affected by the principle of divido- 
genesure which steadily works in all directions in 
favor of the wealthy few. This is the economic 
slavery that the Nineteenth Century has estab- 
lished for the people of the United States. 

The Bulletin shows that this interest charge is 



tContinuation, "On the debt in force against acres, $162,- 
652,944; on lots, $234,789,848," is the yearly interest. 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 125 

for mortgages on acre-tracts and on lots, against 
which the debt of $6,010,670,985 was in force in 
1890, after which it continued to exist and to in- 
crease probably with the same rate as it increased 
in the previous decade. For, nothing special has 
been done to prevent the needy people from 
mortgaging their properties. So the mortgages 
were increasing and the annual interest charge 
against lots and acres, too, continued to increase. 
But the Extra Bulletin No. 98 shows that the 
indebtedness on owned farms was equal to $1,085,- 
00^,060,^^ and the same on owned 

^^^'^ ' ^ ^ ^ INTEREST CHARGE 

homes was equal to $1,046,953,603 ;t on farms and 
so that, added together, these two "°'^^^- 
classes of debt amount to $2,132,949,563, as 
was stated in this Bulletin. And the average rate 
of interest on this debt is shown at the end of the 
second Bulletin to have been 6.65 per cent per 
annum. And ''the annual interest charge is $141,- 
910,106"! that has been a burden on 1,696,670 fam- 
ilies represented here in the table, p. 1 16. Of course, 
thousands of these families have now lost their 
properties forever, as there were liens on their 
farms and homes representing the above total of 
more than 2-billion dollars. 



*Here, p. 112. 
tib., p. 113. 

$Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 902. This interest charge is at the 
end of the Extra Bulletin No. 71. 



126 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

If we now unite the annual interest charge on 

the acres and lots mortgage debt, and the annual 

interest on farms and homes mort- 

INTEREST CHARGE. S^S^ ^^^t, wc find that thcse chargcs 

amount to $539,352,898 in every 

year, which must be paid in any way. 

It is certainly not the yearly charge of the me- 
morial past, but it was stated as existing in the 
year 1890, and would naturally continue as an 
annual interest charge up to the present day. The 
debtors must use an extraordinary efifort in their 
toil, in order to get sufficient results from their 
appHed energy for clearing up this annual interest 
charge, and keeping themselves alive.* And to 
speak about an unusual prosperity of the people 
under such conditions is as absurd as to say that 
the creditors are growing poor from receiving the 
annual interest charge consisting of $539,352,898 
worth of wealth because they get it yearly without 
work. 

Yes, every one that speaks about prosperity in 
the United States knows what he means. For the 
statistical facts prove that there is an unusual pros- 

*Yet, it should be remembered that we do not here deal 
with the debts of Railroad Companies, Street Railway, Tele- 
graph, Telephone and other companies and corporations; nor 
do we deal with the U. S. debt of $891,960,104; States, $228,- 
997,389; Counties, $145,048,045; Municipalities, $724,463,060; 
School districts, $36,701,948, which in 1890 made the grand 
total of $18,027,170,546 including the debt under our consid- 
eration. But we deal with family-debtors, for whom debt is 
equal to ruin. Whereas debt to the others is prosperity. 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 127 

perity for the very few that the tens of mihions of 
individuals are bound to work for. But, is it pros- 
perity for these mihions of the propertyless * * 'i^ 
and debtors? No, there is positive enslavement for 
them and their children. And it is the innocent 
children or posterity that are to be specially pitied. 

These tens of milHons of individuals become 
weaker and weaker consumers of their own prod- 
ucts and products of the nation. So that, the few 
prosperous families are obliged to look after wider 
foreign markets to export to the produce that the 
milHons here have no means, no purchasing power 
to acquire. It has long been the case in England, 
where millions of the people wear overcoats, for in- 
stance, from 5 to lo years each, without being able 
to procure new ones; while the exports of all goods 
are ever going on to the different foreign markets. 
And the United States are growing similar to Great 
Britain in almost every respect. * * * 

"The percentages representing encumbrance for 
various rates of interest," says the Extra Bulletin 
No. 71, ''show that 'the larger en- ^^^^^^^,^,^^^^^^ 

' ° RATES OF INTEREST 

cumbrances bear the lower rates of are hsgher on 
interest, as a general fact." And the ™^ ''®°"- 
differences in the rates of interest are from "less 
than 6 to greater than 12 per cent." Hence, the 
poorer the mortgagors, the greater the weight of 
oppression they bear; and the greater oppression 
they bear, the quicker they lose their properties. 



128 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

and the greater becomes the number of tenants and 
of economic slaves which we have. 

The brute-minded creditors think that it is nat- 
ural to skin the helpless, because they have no 
great security for the loans. 

What is the significance of mortgages for the 
nation? And what do other men acquainted with 
mortgages think of them? 

The significance of mortgages has already been 
considered by many thoughtful men, and it is not 
out of place to quote here the ready views of some 
of them. 

SIGNIFICANCE. 

As there are two economic classes of the people 
in the United States,* so ''there are two views, both 
of which must be understood." The 
^^"^viEws!"^^'^ view presented by writers like Mr. 
Edward Atkinson is known to some 
people as worthy of regard, notwithstanding that 
these writers knock their heads against a moun- 
tainous wall of facts. "They argue that the mort- 
gage is an indication of prosperity." Mr. Atkinson 
says, in the "Forum" for May, 1895, writing (be- 
fore the complete mortgage returns given above 
had been reported) concerning the census returns 
for 33 States: 

*That is, if we divide them by the line of families worth 
$5,000 and over, and families worth $5,000 and under; and 
the latter will include the economic dependants. 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 129 

"The first startling fact is that in these 33 States 
and Territories nearly 7,000,000 mortgages have 
been recorded in ten years for a total sum of nearly 
$9,500,000,000. The final statement, covering the 
whole country, which has not yet been published, 
discloses the fact that 9,517,747 mortgages were 
executed in the decade 1880-89 to the amount of 
$12,094,877,793."! * * * 

And then because "on the first of January, 1890, 
the amount of these mortgages remaining unpaid 
in the whole United States was $6,019,679,985,$ 
Mr. Atkinson says : "It therefore appears that dur- 
ing the decade one-half of the mortgage debt in- 
curred had already been paid." But he forgets to 
deal with the process of losing property by the 
thousands of the debtors who appeared without 
property in 1890. 

And being uncertain about mortgages on acres 
and lots at the beginning of the last decade, he 
infers that "the least estimate of the sum due on 
acres and lots at the beginning of this period 
(1880-90) would be $1,500,000,000." And con- 
tinues that "these original mortgages executed 
prior to 1880 must have been wholly liquidated, 
mostly by payment." * * * 

As regards this point we have equal or even 
greater reason to say that those mortgages have 



tHere, p. 119. 
IHere, p. 121. 



130 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

mostly been liquidated by an absolute loss of prop- 
erty, because at the end of the decade we have had 
many millions of propertyless families. 

But the chief feature of the situation Mr. Atkin- 
son wishes to vindicate is that the mortgage 
growth indicates prosperity and not the system of 
tenancy and landlordism as in Great Britain. He 
says : 

'The evidence is conclusive that the increase of 
hired farms does not imply the permanent estab- 
lishment of the relations of landlord 
PRIMOGENITURE. ^^^ tcuaut after the English fashion. 
It does not imply the concentration 
of land in fewer hands, but rather the reverse. It 
does imply better and more intelligent methods of 
agriculture, larger and more varied crops pro- 
duced from lessening areas of land throughout the 
whole great grain-growing section,"* and so on. 

As to the prosperity, I will say, that a family se- 
curing a large amount of borrowed money or cap- 
ital at low rates of interest may 

CONDITIONS OF i j. u az • i. 

PROSPERITY. prosper under mortgage by emcient- 
ly applying the capital on its wealth, 
by efficiently applying the labor energy of the 
family members, and, especially, by efficiently ap- 
plying hired labor upon its farm or any other kind 
of property. So that, only those mortgagor fam- 
ilies can have prosperity, which are aided by many 



*Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 904, Edition of 1897. 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 131 

agencies in drawing incomes from their land. 
While all the poorer families must be ruined by the 
mortgages. 

As to the argument that we have no establish- 
ment of tenancy after the English fashion of primo- 
geniture, it is enough to refer the reader to the 
third chapter of this work, and beg him to under- 
stand it well by reading a second time. For the 
effects of primogeniture and dividogenesure are 
the same, as both principles demand that millions 
of individuals should divide the sole results of their 
applied energy with the few owners of capital and 
wealth, or else these millions must starve without 
employment. They produce economic slavery in 
England and in the United States, where most of 
the people are now propertyless and therefore help- 
less. 

Dividogenesure, however, differs from primo- 
geniture by including all mortgagors into its 
sphere of oppression. 

And it seems to me perfectly naive to assert that 
''larger and more varied crops are produced from 
lessening areas of land throughout 
the whole grain-growing section" of ^'^^^^^ 

the country. For it really means 
that the more land the people lose through mort- 
gages, the better crops they will produce, and 
hence the best crops must be produced by them 
when they lose all the land they formerly owned. 



132 THE IxMPENDING CRISIS. 

But Mr. Atkinson does not here deal with the 
fact that more than 64 per cent of the population 
in 420 cities and towns, and jy per cent of it in 
the 28 largest cities are also tenants of homes, be- 
side the tenants of farms he writes about. He 
does not speak of the fact that the 420 cities and 
towns actually belong to less than 24 per cent of their 
population, and that the 28 great cities in the United 
States really belong to less than 14 per cent of their 
population ; and that the whole population of the 448 
cities and towns are bound, by dividogensure, to 
work in one or other way for the small per cent 
of their wealthy neighbors, the only independent 
population that holds the others in slavery. A 
dealing with these tenants would disprove his posi- 
tion. See appendix I. 

Mr. G. H. Holmes, writing in the ^'Annals of the 
American Academy and Social Science Quarterly," 
gives a more balanced view on the subject. He 
says :* 

'While mortgage debtors must admit that they 
have done better to obtain real estate on credit 
than not to obtain as much of it as 
Ei^FECTS^ they have done, or not to obtain it at 
all, they are nevertheless in a situa- 
tion where they feel the pinching effects of a reduc- 
tion or loss of income more than real-estate owners 



*Enc, of Soc, Reform, p. 904, 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 133 

do who are not debtors. This is owing to the in- 
terest that is wanted by the mortgagee." 

While a still better view is given by Rev. Wm. 
Bliss, editor of the Encyclopedia of Social Re- 
form, f He says: 

^The mortgage indicates a hope of progress, but 
also a slavery to interest under which many sink." 

It is exactly the point of reality, for many prop- 
ertied families borrow money with the hope of get- 
ting economically better off, but the 
hopes mostly deceive them, and they ''o^f^vVrTmTny^^ 
find themselves in the trap of slavery 
on account of paying too high rate of interest for 
the loans they obtain. And it is this slavery to in- 
terest that makes them absolutely propertyless, 
slaves to dividogenesure. 

And it follows that the claim of Mr. Atkinson, 
that mortgages are profitable to both the mort- 
gagor and the mortgagee is only true in the cases 
of paying the rates of interest not exceeding 3 per 
cent per annum, which, however, does not exist in 
America. And if this rate had been in existence, 
then, an effective application of all possible 
agencies of production could make the mortgages 
profitable to the mortgagors and the mortgagees. 
While under the present conditions they are only 
ruinous to the former and most profitable to the 
latter. 



tib., p. 904. 



134 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

But let us see the other view on mortgages which 
must be understood too. 

'The view that America is becoming a nation 
of tenants is well known," says Mr. J. P. Dunn, Jr., 
writing in the Political Science 
sEMi-PES^snviisTic Quarterly for March, 1890, after de- 
scribing the situation as regards the 
Western States.* 

"BURDEN OF DEBT." 

"The mortgage indebtedness of the Western 
States is a matter worthy the attention of econ- 
omists and statesmen, as well as of 
""iMrvm ™ the people of those States. What- 
ever may be thought of its effects, it 
is a fact — mountainous and immovable. And more, 
the probabilities that loom far above the figures 
here presented make it very questionable whether 
the alarmists who have discussed the subject have 
in fact materially exaggerated the existing condi- 
tions. * * * 

"If the people of the Western States may be con- 
sidered thrifty and judicious, the people of Mich-" 
igan may, and by the official records their condi- 



*Mr. Dunn could not have known at the time that some 
Eastern States were even worse than the Western ones, and 
that "New York," for instance, "is" more "conspicuously 
prominent as having a real estate mortgage indebtedness of 
$1,607,874,301, which is 26.71 per cent of the total indebted- 
ness on acres and lots in the United States," 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 135 

tion appears to be as bad as that of their 
neighbors in Indiana. In 1887 an attempt was made 
by the bureau of statistics to ascertain the mort- 
gage debt of the State through personal declara- 
tions of the owners of land. * * * The re- 
turns show (report of 1888) that the real estate 
mortgages of the State amount to $129,229,553, 
with an annual interest payment of $9,451,851 on 
a total realty valuation of $686,- 

614,741. Of this amount $64,392,- ^SrIcSres' 
580 is on farms, and the annual 
interest charge is $4,636,265," which the farms pay 
out of their produce. 'The number of foreclosures 
made during the year was 1,667, and in only 131 
cases were redemptions made, leaving a net loss of 
1,536 pieces of property by foreclosure in one year. 
The situation apparently justifies the statement of 
Commissioner Heath that a very large per cent of 
the people seem to be in a financial rut, and are 
unable to extricate themselves." 

Here you are. Mr. Dunn's view is not an argu- 
ment based upon an inference from a guess, but on 
immovable facts of evidence which 
testify that the State of Michigan jioffo losses! 
alone assists the prosperity of the fev/ 
v/ealthy families by the yearly contributions of 
$9,451,851 worth of wealth produced by the labor 
energy of its debtors. And that in addition to this 
contribution, the same debtors make a net loss of 



136 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

1,536 pieces of property by foreclosure in one year. 
That's how this civilized nation regulates the sys- 
tem of money-lending for helping the people to 
live. And that's how the civilized slavery is insti- 
tuted. It is by becoming mortgagors that the fam- 
ilies pass from a bad degree of slavery to a worse, 
until they lose all property, and become totally 
helpless slaves of dividogenesure. 

But do not flatter yourself by thinking that this 
is only the fate of Michigan. No, the people's 
economic conditions are more or less similar in all 
the States and Territories, and some States are 
much worse ofT than Michigan, as the statistics 
show their situation. 

Mr. D. R. Goodloe, in the 'Torum" for Novem- 
ber, 1890 (not knowing yet the facts of the East), 
says: 

"The conclusion from this melancholy array of 

facts is irresistible. The virgin soil of the West is 

rapidly ceasing to be the home and 

^HUwiAmTY.'' ^^^^ possession of the sturdy Amer- 
ican freeman. He is but a tenant at 
will, or a dependent upon the tender mercies of 
soulless corporations and of absentee landlords. 
We have abolished monarchy, and primogeniture, 
and church establishments supported by the State, 
yet the universal curse of humanity, the monopoly 
of the earth by the wealthy few, remains." * * * 

And I can tell Mr. Goodloe that these few have 



MORTGAGOR FAMILIES. 137 

monopolized, not only the earth of the country, 
but also the hundreds of cities and towns, together 
with their buildings, their capital, their natural and 
artificial wealth, their houses, etc., etc., and the 
tens of millions of the inhabitants of these towns 
and cities too, have been economically enslaved, 
under the system of dividogenesure, to the same 
wealthy few. 



CHAPTER VI. 

CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH IN MONOPO- 
LIES, ETC. 

The first and the second chapters have revealed 
to us that, since the year 1890, there have been 
nearly 34-millions of individuals without property 
in the United States. The third chapter has shown 
that about one-half the results of their labor must 
be expended for the necessary support of exist- 
ence, while the other half must go to enrich the 
owners of rentable farms and homes for which these 
owners draw incomes from the propertyless, with- 
out any labor or without any expenditure of their 
own energy. Besides this, out of the more than 
47-millions of individuals in the gainful pursuits/'' 
there must have been hundreds of thousands of 
families who have small properties, like homes, but 
their members have been obliged to support them- 
selves by laboring under the same conditions of 
dividogenesure as did the propertyless. 

If we admit then that there have been only 38,- 
837,849 individuals in the gainful 
FROM^HE^pooR. P^fsuits absolutcly under the prin- 
ciple of dividogenesure, and that if 
one million families have employed them in vari- 



"^Here, pp. 91, 92, or Mayo Smith, Statistics and Sociology, 
p. 200. 

138 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 139 

ous ways, gaining 25 cents daily from each person 
thus employed, the total daily income of these fam- 
ilies would be $9,709,462 per every day."*" And if 
the labor year on an average, for all, consists of 250 
days, the yearly income of the million families 
would amount to $2,327,365,500. This amount 
then would be yearly added to the aggregate 
wealth of the fourth group of the 2d R. table, p. 
47. Though most of the income would go to only 
a few families among the million. 

And if the mortgagor families continued to exist 
even without an increase in their numbers — which 
is really impossible, for the mort- 
gages certainly must have increased thTdebjq^s 
— and continued to pay the annual 
interest charge at the rate of $539,352,898, as has 
been stated on pp. 125, 126, then the yearly income 
of the wealthy families in the 4th group of the 2d 
R. table must have been still greater than what 
they could get from the propertyless alone on the 
condition of giving them employment, and renting 
them the rentable farms and homes. In fact, the 
direct and indirect profit in favor of the wealthy 
few from the appHcation of the labor energy of 
the above millions of the economically enslaved 
would amount to $20,067,028,786 worth of wealth 
during seven years. And what do we have? 

Mr. G. B. Waldron, continuing the estimates of 



*As the rates of their gains show, pp. 104, 105. 



140 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

the increase of wealth by the Director of the Mint, 
from 1870 to 1897, has shown that by 1890 the in- 
crease of wealth had reached $65,037,- 
"^WEALTH^'' 091,197, as has been already stated 
in several places, while in 1897 the 
increase amounted to $86,825,000,000 worth/^ So 
that an addition of $21,787,908,803 worth of wealth 
has been made by the people's energy during seven 
years. Yet, with this enormous increase of the 
wealth in seven years, listen ! listen ! to what the 
statisticians said in 1897: 

''In the United States wealth has increased 

phenomenally; wages since 1873 have fallen (on 

account of too great supply of la- 

co™usioNS ^^^^ ' ^^^ concentration of capital has 

increased; the number of the out of 

work has grown."t Some men tried to minimize 

the significance of these statements by proving 

the contrary situation. Mr. Atkinson is one of 

those who said that "wages have risen and prices 

fallen," which view he entertained on the bases of 

government reports. But all such arguments 

"have been shown in the article 'Wages' of Enc. of 

Soc. Reform, to be false." J And Prof. Mayo Smith 



*Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1386. — Wa!droi\, "Handbook on 
Currency or Wealth." 

tReferences: Enc. of Soc. R., see "Unemployment." Dr. 
Spahr, "Present Distribution of Wealth in U. S." (1896). — J. 
R. Common's "Distribution of Wealth," Enc. p. 1392. 

$Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1392. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 141 

has disproved all attempts of these men to show 
that the wages have risen, on the whole, by show- 
ing the falsehood of the averages such men repre- 
sented in their argumients.f 

Further, the fundamental doctrine of wages in 
economics is that the rates of wages depend prin- 
cipally on the efficiency of labor and ^^^ economic 
on supply and demand of labor, doctrine of the 

-ru ^ ■ -r.-u re • c ^u 1 u RATE OF WAGES. 

That IS, if the emciency of the labor- 
ers is high, the wages can be high, and if the de- 
mand is great and the number of the laborers small, 
the wages are again high; but if the demand for 
laborers is small, and the supply is large, the wages 
must naturally be low, whether the ef!iciency of the 
laborers is high or low. 

The wages in the United States since 1873, on 
the whole, have gradually fallen, but not so low 
as they ought to have done. For, as 
the propertyless people have in- ^'^^fcVr^'ow!' 
creased in numbers up to tens of mil- 
lions, the wages should have fallen twice as low, 
otherwise only half the employees at a time should 
have employment, because of the over-supply of 
laborers. But, since the trade-unions have been 
organized, the wages have artificially been kept up 
(for the employed) by these organizations, and by 
the employers themselves to some extent. 

''A trade union," says Mr. Webb, "is a continu- 

tEnc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1370. 



142 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

ous association of wage-earners for the purpose of 
maintaining or improving the conditions of their 

employment.* The chief object of 
ficTau.y\eptup ^^ ^^ ^^ elevate the social position 

of its members. * * * It is a 
union of individual forces in order to compete 
against the undue and unfair encroachments of cap- 
ital into the continuance of the established well- 
being of the united individuals. "f Hence, "the 
trade unions wish to keep up the rates of wages, 
and to prevent a laborer from accepting employ- 
ment, under stress of starvation, on terms which 
in its common judgment would be injurious to the 
union's interests. And they would rather encour- 
age idleness than cheap labor. Such idea existed 
with them since the beginning, or when it orig- 
inated. This idea originated in 1741," says Mr. 
Webb,t ''but the special enforcing of it commenced 
dt the beginning of the eighteenth century." * * ''' 
And surely many an employer knows very well 
what the ''Strike in Detail" of the trade unions un- 
der this enforcing means. 

The trade unions have used all the means in their 
power for the purpose of holding up the wages. 
But, if the wages have fallen notwithstanding the 



*Mr. and Mrs. Webb, "History of Trade Unionism," p. i 
or 2. 

t"Introduction and Mutual Insurance," vol. I, pp. 148-9, 
1 50- 1 164. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 143 

artificial support, their falling testifies to the pres- 
ence of a mightier force pressing them down. 

In 1896 it was said that, ''according to the last 
volume of the Connecticut Labor Report and the 
Massachusetts Statistics of Manufac- „„„^^ .»,„„.„^^ 

GROSS INCOMES 

tures, the nominal rate of wages in of workers 
1894 had declined 7 per cent below 
the level of 1892, while the yearly incomes of labor- 
ers had been still farther reduced by the lack of 
employment." The Connecticut Report testifies 
that wages for the same period fell about 10 per 
cent, and it says that "the heavy losses of the wage- 
earners, however, came not from reduced pay, but 
from reduced employment, and that the reduction 
in pay and in the employment had decreased the 
total wage-payments 25 per cent." And ''the great 
mass of famihes in Connecticut had had their in- 
comes reduced one-fourth," says Dr. Spahr.* So 
that, in Connecticut and Massachusetts, together, 
"the family incomes of the laborers between 1892 
and 1894 fell at least 20 per cent. In Pennsylvania 
they fell 24 per cent. The fall of wages in agri- 
culture from 1890 to 1894 reduced the incomes 
of laborers to the extent of 20 per cent."t And the 
rents of houses, on the whole, have risen against 
the homeless. 

It is not necessary to multiply the same examples 



*Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 1370, 1373 and the Labor Re- 
ports. tDr. Spahr, ib., pp. 116, 117. 



144 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

in the remaining States, since we know that the 
supply of labor has increased throughout in the 
United States; and since we know that the demand 
for labor has proportionately decreased. And, con- 
sequently, the wages in general must have fallen 
according to the fundamental principles of econom- 
ics, because of the increase of population without 
property and without resources. 

Now then, if the incomes of, say, 40-millions of 
individuals in the gainful pursuits, have on the 

«,uo nonr.To wholc bccu rcduccd; and all these 

WHO rnOrlTS 

BY THE INCREASE miUious of pcoplc havc been made 

OF WEALTH? ^^^^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^..^^^ 

to ask : Who was profited by the phenomenal in- 
crease of wealth during the period of the seven 
years? In other words: Who had obtained the 
amount of $21,787,908,803 worth, the increase of 
wealth up to 1897? Is it the group of tenants, or 
the group of mortgagors? or is it the group of 
owners of free farms and homes worth $5,000 and 
under, as they are represented in the 2d R. taHe, 
p. 47? And was it possible for all these highly 
productive families to retain a goodly share of this 
phenomenal increase of the wealth? 

The above total of the increased wealth, divided 
by the 7 years, gives, on the average, an increase 
of $3,112,558,400 every year. It being, of course, 
understood that this average was smaller in the 
year 1891, and augmenting year by year, it became 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 145 

largest in the year 1897. And this augmenting 
necessitates a progressive increase in the business 
of all monopolies, trusts and combinations, highly 
increasing the gross and the net incomes of all. 

THE TOTAL ITEMS OF THE CONCENTRATION 
OF WEALTH. 

Let US then sum up the net earnings of the nat- 
ural monopolies alone, as they are given on p. loi, 
leaving out their necessary increase 

consequent upon the unavoidable .^.f^^^^.S^^LfES. 
growth of business in their favor dur- 
ing the seven years. The net earnings of $563,- 
689^333 by these monopolies in every year amount 
to $3^945.825,33 1 worth of wealth in seven years. 
This is one item of positive loss by tens of millions 
of the people in favor of a few families, connected 
with the monopolies. 

Another item of similar earnings, we have seen 
on pp. 125, 126, consists of the annual interest 
charge, equal to $539,352,898, from ^^^^^^^ ^^ 
the results of labor of the mortgagor mortgagee 
families, who are compelled to lose "°'^°po'-ies. 
this amount of their substance yearly in conse- 
quence of the abnormal distribution of wealth in 
general. And, as there is no reason to suppose 
that mortgages were not increasing in their num- 
bers, and the mortgagor families were not losing 
their properties by foreclosure, so there is no reason 
whatever to suppose that the above annual interest 



146 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

charge against mortgages, on the whole, had 
diminished up to 1897. Hence, we consider that the 
above annual interest charge continued to be paid 
at least as it was paid in 1890. For, in order to 
diminish it or to stop its ruinous effects, some im- 
portant reform must be accomplished, which, how- 
ever, has not been done. 

The annual interest charge of $539,352,898, 
against the private family-mortgages, in seven 
years amounts to $3,775,470,286 worth of wealth 
or of the products of the mortgagor families, lost 
during the period in favor of group 4 of the 2d 
table (p. 45 or 47). This amount is in addition to 
''' the net earnings of $3,945,825,331, which accrued 
to the same group of families in the table. 

Further, we have seen in the lower table, p. 116, 
that there were 4,999,396 families that hire their 

homes, because being homeless. 
SS'homes' A^^ this number of the homeless 

must be augmented by 246,938 fam- 
ilies, found in the group of the "tenants of farms 
and homes," which are represented by the author 
of the same 2d table to be so many more than the 
lower and upper tables, p. 116, contain of the ten- 
ant families. We have therefore tO' deal with 
5,246,334 families that hire their homes* mainly 

*The above 246,938 families could not be here classified 
among the tenants of farms consisting of the 1,624,765 fam- 
ilies, because after losing their country properties, these 
homeless hurry on to crowd up cities. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 147 

in the 448 cities and towns we have spoken about 
on pp. 81, 1 14-15, 132. For it is they that find 
shelter in the rentable houses of these cities, towns, 
etc., by paying rents. And our problem is to find 
the amount of rent they paid to the owners of these 
houses. 

An example of average monthly rentals may here 
be presented for Boston, as follows: 

Monthly rentals under $5 average $4 

From $5 to $10 average 8 

From $10 to $15 average 12I 

From $15 to $20 averagei6 % 

From $20 to $25 average 22* 

These averages may be too small for many cities 
and too large for the whole United States. But if 
we take the general average for all 
families at $9.50 a month, it will hquseTent. 
probably be little below,t but cannot 
be above the true one. In fact, if every family of 
4.93 members paid an average of $9.50 of monthly 
rent, it would indicate only the net income in favor 
of the owners of the rentable houses, and absolute 
losses on the side of the homeless. 

Now then, by paying $9.50 a month each, the 
5.246,334 homeless families paid $598,082,076 rent 
in one year. And by paying the same amount 
seven years, without regarding the increase of fam- 

*Dr. Spahr, ibid, p. 122-3. 

tAs numerous inquiries convince me. 



148 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

ilies, they paid $4,186,574,532 v/orth of their 
energy, as an unavoidable tribute to those that 
speculate in their comfortable beds, while perform- 
ing every action by the hired labor of agents and 
building new houses by hired laborers. 

Furthermore, we have seen in the upper table, 
p. 116, that there were other 1,624,765 families that 
hire their farms, because being landless. 

If we regard the average tenements of these 

families at 136 acres of land per family,* we shall 

find that the 1,624,765 tenant fam- 

REN^ABLE'urs. ^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^ 220,968,040 acres of 
land every year. Although this gen- 
eral average for all farmers in the United States 
may be a little too small for the tenant famiUes, be- 
cause their acreage increases much more rapidly 
than that of the families owning their farms, as we 
shall soon see, yet we shall consider this average 
as it is given. 

As to the average rent per acre of the farming 
land for the United States, the general average 
was $2.81 for wheat and $3.03 for corn raising 
lands.f 

Supposing, however, that many farm tenants 
hold the grazing and other less valued lands, let 
us even admit that the general average rent per 

*According to the U. S. Census of 1890, there were 4,564,- 
641 farms consisting of 623,218,619 acres of land, or an aver- 
age of 136 acres to a farm. World Almanac, 1899, P- 184. 

tEnc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 22, 23; also based on the census. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 149 

acre was only $2.75 for all lands hired by these 
tenants. 

By paying then $2.75 of rent per acre, the 
1,624,765 tenant families paid $607,662,110 in one 
year for the 220,968,040 acres of land 
that does not belong to them. And lamd monopolies. 
by paying the same amount seven 
years — from 1891 to 1897 inclusive — they paid 
$4,253,634,770 worth of wealth to a number of the 
speculators upon land and upon the energy of the 
farmers who are the slaves of dividogenesure. It 
follows that every farming family of this group, on 
the average, paid about $374 for the land alone. 

It seems, however, that there are many farm 
tenants that pay separate rents for the farm houses. 
And in the year 1890 these paid 
the total of $140,000,000 of the "on rirmT 
house rent, says Dr. C. B. Spahr.'^ 
By paying this rent seven years they paid an addi- 
tional amount of $980,000,000 worth of their 
crystalHzed energy. Including this total into the 
general total of house rents, let us now sum up the 
above losses of the productive people, which are 
the gains of the few monopolists and speculators 
for the seven years as follows in the ist table of 
concentration of wealth on the next page: 



*'Tresent Distribution of Wealth in the U. S.," pp. 104, 
105; (see here: Appendix I.). The same: Enc. of Soc. Re- 
form, p. 1385 — table of incomes, 1890. 



150 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

1st Table of Concentration of Wealth. 



Monopolies and Combinations. 


Total Net Incomes. 


The natural monopoliesf 

Mortgagee monopoliesf 

Companies, etc. of rentable houses. 
Monopolies of rentable lands 


$ 3,945,825,331 
3,775,470,286 
5,166,574,532 
4,253,634,770 


Cxrand total 


^17,141,504,919 





Even this grand total indicates that a nation of 
thirty millions of individuals would be rich by it, 
yet it does not include many other net incomes. 

Besides these certain facts, the highest rentals 

tSome one may suppose that some net earnings of the 
national banks might overlap some net earnings of the mort- 
gagee monopolies, since mortgage profits are often obtained 
by banks. But such a supposition cannot have a real ground 
here, because the national banks are prohibited by the law 
of the United States to make investments in mortgages; and 
because mortgages of real estate, being not easily convertible 
securities for loans, would not be admissible by them. The 
only exception made by the law for these banks is that, for 
a necessary accommodation of their business, a mortgage 
may sometimes be held as a security, collateral to some 
other which is more easily convertible into currency. (See 
Revised Statutes, §5137. Prof. Dunbar's 'Theory and Hist, 
of Banking," p. 26. 

It is the non-national or State banks that often directly 
deal with mortgages. But estimating their gross earnings 
at $200,000,000 for the year 1890 (see p. loi), Mr. Waite evi- 
dently could not ascertain their enormous net incomes, 
hence we leave them to be understood as surplus above all 
our concluding totals of net incomes. 

And whereas, the net incomes of the national banks de- 
creased $110,378,930 in the 7 years, those of the life insur- 
ance companies increased $108,932,030 (World Almanac, 1900, 
p. 180, 184) and with the help of the omitted net incomes of 
the gas companies (p. loi) more than offset the loss, leaving 
our totals correct. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 151 

derived from the offices, hotels, and other rentable 
properties found in the central parts of the cities 
above and below 100,000 population are to be as- 
certained. And no one will doubt that the com- 
paratively very few owners of these city-centers 
must have collectively drawn a greater amount of 
the net incomes from rent, than can be expressed 
by three billion dollars' worth of v/ealth, derived 
without work by the few owners of the most valu- 
able parts, especially of the 28 cities far above 100,- 
000 population. 

Further, we have not treated the net earnings of 
the companies and combinations filling up the 
large storehouses of the wholesale and retail busi- 
ness in the same great cities, which distribute the 
industrial products of the people, for consumption 
at home and abroad. And while the distribution of 
these products is carried on by cheap laborers, we 
have not represented here the few monopohsts that 
grow into multi-millionaires behind the busy work 
of the distribution. The net incomes of these will 
be included into the incomes of the Manufacture and 
Mechanical Trades hereafter. 

But further still, we entirely omit the indication 
of the net earnings of ''the meat companies" in 
the large cities, like those of the Chi- ,„^ ^„.,^ 

THE TRUSTS' 

cago stockyards, the cattle compa- net incomes 
nies, uniting more than $100,000,000 ; ^i^'tted. 
combinations of the millions, invested in the ele- 



152 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

vators of the Northwest against the wheat-grow- 
ers; in whiskey and beer about $100,000,000; in 
sugar, $75,000,000; in leather over $100,000,000 
(1894). The trust of piano-makers was to have a 
capital of $50,000,000, and there is the Cordage 
Trust that gets from 40 to 50 per cent on its cap- 
ital; the Cotton Seed Oil Trust and Lard Trust" 
and others.* 

Finally, we have not treated the earnings of some 
other well-known monopolies, trusts and combina- 
tions, which have, as all the others, been established 
with no other purpose or end in view than to draw 
from the productive people all they can for them- 
selves by means of speculation. For, drawing 
wealth by combined speculation is the easiest thing 
in the world for those who were enabled to make 
its beginning. 

Omitting the above trusts and combinations, be- 
cause of the uncertainty of their net earnings, we 
OWNERS OF THE ^^^^ positivc mcaus to find out the 
CENTRAL PARTS his^hcst rentals of all central parts of 

OF THE CITIES. ^, •^- -, ^ i r u 

the cities and towns spoken of be- 
fore. In estimating the total income of the nation 
for the year 1890, Dr. Spahr found that ''the total 
income from house and office rents, as estimated in 
the text" (his text) "is one-seventh of the total in- 



*Enc. of Soc. Reform, 18^7, pp. 1346-7; from "Philadel- 
phia Times," etc. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 153 

come of the non-agricultural population."* And 
the total income of the latter population was 
$8,200,000,000,** one-seventh of which is equal to 
$1,171,428,571 3-7 — apart from the agricultural 
land rents. This one-seventh, then, paid seven 
times in seven years, amounted to the same $8,200,- 
000,000, which amount shows that the owners of 
the central parts of the cities and towns obtained 
at least $3,033,425,468 rent from their properties. 

It does not, however, make a difference whether 
we accept the whole amount of rent estimated by 
Dr. Spahr or simply add the three billions and over 
to our grand total, p. 150. In any way, these facts 
indicate that the wealth has concentrated with the 
very families that were enormously wealthy in 1890 
and appeared to be much wealthier in 1897. 

Yet the concentration of wealth is not only very 
rapid in drawing the wealth of all the 11,190,152 
families worth $5,000 and underf to concentration 
a very few families of the 4th group of wealth in 
in the 2d table,tt but it is also rapid "'^"^"^ ^''"^''^^• 
among the families worth $5,000 and over,J so 
that all are crushed by the monopolies, the trusts 
and combinations. In order to illustrate it, I here 
quote the same authority that estimated the in- 

*Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 104-5. 

**It was the gross income. 

tSec the upper table, p. 42. 

ttTable, p. 47. 

tLower table, p. 42, ist two groups. 



154 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

crease of the wealth from 1890 to 1897 before mak- 
ing a conclusion from the foregoing, respecting 
industries, as follows: 

"As to development of 'the' trusts before 1890," 
Mr. G. B. Waldron says : 

''Of the manufacturing and mechanical indus- 
tries, whose statistics were returned in the census 
of 1890, there are 43 whose nianu- 

iNDUSTRiES factured product for the year 1889 
was about $30,000,000, whose capital 
averaged above $10,000 per establishment, and 
which admitted of comparison with the census of 
1880. Of these 43 industries we have chosen 30 as 
especially illustrating the growing concentration of 
capital during the 10 years from 1880 to 1890. 

"It is a significant fact that while in 1880 these 
industries were carried on by 84,708 establish- 
ments, or about 33 per cent of the total number of 
manufacturing establishments of the country, the 
same industries in 1890 were carried on by only 
69,659 establishments, or about 22 per cent of the 
total establishments, and fewer in number by over 
15,000 than in 1880. 

"The value of the total product of these 30 indus- 
tries in 1880 was $3,125,915,574, or 58 per cent of 
the total manufacturing products of the country. 
In 1890 these same industries produced products 
to the value of $4,595,804,626, or about 51 per cent 
pf the total product, 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 155 

'The concentration of capital in these 30 indus- 
tries is shown from the fact that in 1880 their total 
capital was $1,735,577,540, or an average of $20,- 
489 per establishment, while in 1890 their total cap- 
ital reached $3,468,277,249, or $49,789 per estab- 
lishment, a gain of 143 per cent in 10 years. There 
has been a similar concentration of employees in 
these industries. In 1880 the 84,708 establish- 
ments used 1,340,490 employees, or an average of 
16 to an establishment. In 1890 there were 1,964,- 
232 employees in these industries, or an average of 
28 to an establishment."* 

This is a separate and an additional item of the 
concentration of wealth which undoubtedly con- 
tinued — from 1890 to 1897 — to farther aggravate 
the general situation, shown by the grand total of 
the net incomes in favor of monopolies, on p. 150, 
beside the uncertain ones. 

For the 30 different industries, taken out of the 
43, have perhaps forever supplanted 15,049 fac- 
tories and other establishments in ten years. Dur- 
ing the same time the supplanters did much more 
than double their own capital. In fact the increase 
in the capital of these supplanters reached the 
amount of $1,732,699,709 over the capital they had 
in 1880. 

But, if Mr. Waldron would investigate the same 



*Mr. Waldron, "Hand-book on Currency or Wealth," pp. 
106 and 107. See also: Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1389. 



156 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

facts in the total number of industries, he could 
probably show us that the supplanting of different 
establishments reached at least 21,586, and that the 
increase of capital reached over two billion dollars' 
worth with the fewer supplanters. That is, if the 
above rate of concentration of the capital were the 
same, as it must have been, throughout the indus- 
trial operations in the entire country. 

And while there was also the concentration of 
the employees, we know that, with the astonishing 
increase of the capital in favor of the supplanting 
trusts, the wages of these employees have fallen,* 
notwithstanding that their highly productive labor 
enormously increased the capital of the fewer em- 
ployers. 

As regards the fall of wages in all the manufac- 
turing industries since 1890, it will not be out of 
place to state here the minimum injury thereby 
sustained by the employees in the seven years un- 
der our consideration. 

When all the available data of the Eleventh 
Census were published, Dr. Spahr started to esti- 
mate the total income of the nation for the year 
1890. In estimating it he found out that the total 
income of the manufacture and mechanical trades 
alone amounted to $2,790,000,000, including their 



*See the statistical conclusions on the fall of wages, p. 134; 
also Dr. Spahr's "Present Distribution of Wealth," etc., pp. 
95-118. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 157 

net profits of $1,116,000,000 for the year. The 
total number of persons engaged in these trades 
was 5,091,000, of whom 4,650,000 were wage-earn- 
ers, while the remaining 441,000 were officers, firm 
members and clerks. Disregarding these, the aver- 
age of actual wages of the wage-earners for the 
year was $360. After that year these meager 
wages, by reduction and unemployment, ''had de- 
creased 25 per cent," says Dr. Spahr.* 

But if we regard the average reduction of these 
wages at 10 cents a day only, and the average 
labor year at 250 days, leaving thus ^„^„... . „ 

•' . ^ -^ ' ^ SPECIAL LOSSES 

a sufficient room for unemployment, of the 
we then find that the 4,650,000 ^^^^^^-^^R^^Rs. 
wage-earners were losing $116,250,000 every year. 
And distributing the same losses over seven years, 
they have lost $813,750,000 worth of their energy 
in favor of the trusts and combinations. The losses, 
however, have been greater than this amount, al- 
though we consider only this minimum, which is 
simply an increase in the injustice, brought about 
by the principle of dividogenesure. 

But while the real producers of wealth thus con- 
stantly lose their energy in products, 
the net profits of the trusts of these of the~?rus?s 
industries for the year 1890 amount 
ed to $1,1 1 6,000,000. t This great yearly income 

^"Present Distr. of Wealth in U. S." (1896), pp. 104, 105, 
112. Here, pp. 140-143. "Average daily wages: 1873, $2.04; 
1891, $1.69; urban laborers." 

tDr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 104-5. Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1385. 



158 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

excludes all expenses, and excludes even the 
yearly waste of machinery, tools, and of the 
other capital used in operations. Obtain- 
ing such profits seven times in seven years, 
these trusts have profited themselves by about 
$7,812,000,000. And these enormous profits ac- 
crued to them for nothing more than the trouble 
of buying the machinery and other capital that the 
real producers of wealth operated upon, mostly 
under hired supervision. And while the human 
and mechanical forces work out these results, the 
real beneficiaries do nothing but speculate on the 
ways of concentrating the entire increase of wealth 
to their hands. 

The speculative efficiency of these trusts and the 
profound injustice of it will be more apparent, if we 
remember that these profits do, not only imply the 
systematic extortion of the crystalHzed energy of 
the real producers of wealth by means of exorbi- 
tancy in dividogenesure, but they imply a similar 
extortion from the public at large, which consume 
the products of these industries for excessive pay- 
ments. 

The question of the ''excess of selling price over 

the cost of production" in these industries has 

been well ascertained. A cost of pro- 

PRomjCTioN. Auction according to economists, im- 
plies cost of materials used; salaries, 
wages, rent, taxes, insurance, repairs paid; waste of 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 159 

machinery, instruments, and of other capital valued ; 
in short, it implies all expenses, including reasonable 
percentage on stock and reasonable remuneration for 
the troubles of capitalists and entrepreneurs. And 
all these expenses must be collected by means of 
selling prices from consumers of the products. 
While what is unreasonable in such prices under 
ordinary circumstances is called an ''excess of selling 
price over the cost of production." This excess 
was raised by the trusts up to 12.95 per cent in 
1890.* 

If then we take the selling prices even of the 
total profits of $1,116,000,000 of the manufacture 
and mechanical trades for the year 
i890,t and subtract this excess from ^^theTu'blic°'' 
it, we find that the excess amounted 
to $144,522,000 in one year. Admitting that the 
above percentage sustained some fluctuations, we 
cannot but think that, with the increasing activity 
in combinations of the trusts, this percentage of 
the excess must have increased soon after that 
year. So that the average of it, from 1891 to 1897 
inclusive, must have been carried on by the trusts 
in different ways and means. If so, then they 
must have exacted from the consuming public 
fully $1,01 1,654,000 worth of its wealth, as an excess 



*Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 98, 104-5. Also: Statistics of Mas- 
sachusett's Bureau of Labor, 1890, p. 319. 
tDr. Spahr, ibid., p. 104-5. 



160 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

of selling price over the cost of production of the 
goods consumed. This loss of the public wealth, 
of course, does not exclude the losses of the families 
worth $5,000 and over; nor does it include any re- 
lation to exports of the products of these trades. 
The loss simply indicates an extortion from the 
public by perverted morality and profound selfish- 
ness of the combines. 

The next item in the concentration of wealth has 
been drawn from the agricultural regions. 

It has been estimated that the wages and earn- 
ings of all farmers from 1890 to 1895 have fallen 
over 20 per cent;* and that 8,497,- 
oVther^rS. ^o^ persons engaged in agriculture 
have suffered from the fall, according 
to the estimates of Dr. Spahr,t which he based 
upon various reports. If, however, we admit only 
10 cents of this loss from every person, every labor 
day, in favor of the various monopolies, trusts and 
combinations which use the raw materials and 
transport the agricultural materials and products, 
we find that in about 266 working days in one year 
the above people lost $226,020,200 worth of their 
products. Distributing these losses equally over 
seven years we find that these people have lost and 
the monopolies, etc., have gained about $1,582,- 
141,400 worth of their wealth for nothing. And 

*Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 116, 117. 
tibid., pp. 104, 105. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. lCil 

this is only the minimum loss that was carried 
throughout the period of seven years, as constant 
drain. 

Another item of similar losses is represented by 
the 350,000 miners whose wages since 1890 have 
fallen "exceptionally low."* So that 
it would be perfectly safe to regard oF^ji'^E' wiNE^fs^ 
the average fall in their daily wages 
at 15 cents, and the labor year at 266 days, allow- 
ing again for a possible unemployment. This be- 
ing so, they have lost about $13,965,000 in one 
year. And as their average wages did not really 
rise again during the period under consideration, 
they must, therefore, have lost about $97755>ooo 
worth of their labor energy in favor of the mining 
trusts and monopolies. While the profits of these 
monopoHes in 1890 amounted to $80,000,000,* 
when the total income was $210,000,000 which we 
leave out of further consideration. p^Q^^J^ q^ J^^^ 
The $80,000,000 profits must nat- mining 

11 1 • 1 vu .u MONOPOLIES. 

urally have mcreased with these mo- 
nopolies. But even if repeated as they were in that 
year, they must have amounted to $560,000,000 
during the seven years. Considering the excess of 
selling price over the cost of production here at 
the rate of 12.95 per cent, this amount of net profits 
includes $72,520,000 worth of the pubHc losses, of 
unjustifiable extortion. 

*Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 104-5. 



162 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

Beside all this, I find the telephone and tele- 
graph monopoliesf had an increase of $229,624,- 
566, and the railroad monopoliesf of $80,377,053 
in their net earnings over and above the amount 
on pp. loi, 150. The same course is true of many 
other monopolies and combinations. 

And as Henry B. Brown, Associate Justice of 
the United States Supreme Court, in an address 
at the Yale Law School, June 24, 1895, said: 

'Tf no student can light his lamp without paying 

to one company; if no housekeeper can buy a 

pound of meat or of sugar without 

ALL PRODUCTS ^ ^,. , . . ^ , 

ABSORBED BY sweUuig the receipts of two or three 
COMBINATIONS, ^^j pervading trusts, what is to pre- 
vent the entire productive industry of the country 
becoming ultimately absorbed by a hundred 
gigantic corporations?"* The foregoing facts 
clearly show that the corporations, whether under 
boards of trustees or under directors of monop- 
olies, with the principle of dividogenesure do, not 
only absorb the entire mass of products of the peo- 
ple, but absorb even the wealth that was formerly 
produced and now being gradually lost. 

But let us now turn to the meaning of the in- 
crease of the population in connection with the 
preceding facts and estimates for the seven years. 
The table on the next page shows it. 



tWorld Almanac, 1899, pp. 200, 225. 
*Quoted from Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1347. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 



163 



Increase of Population. 



Years. 



Individuals. 



1790. 
1800. 
1810. 
1820. 
1830. 
1840. 



3,929,214 

5,308,463 

7,239,881 

9,633,822 

12,866,020 

17,069,453 



Percenls 
in Cities. 



3 

3 

4 

4 

6.72 

8.52 



35 

97 
93 
93 



Years. 



Individuals. 



1850 

1860 
1870 
1880 
1890 
1897 



23,191,897 
31,443,321 

38,588,371 
50,155,783 
62,622,250 
71,551,571 



Percents 
in Cities. 



12.49 
16.13 

20.93 

2.57 

29.20 

t 



The preceding table shows that, from 1891 to 
1897 inclusively, the population of the United 
States increased by about 8,929,321 
individuals, or, distributing this population. 
number over seven years, the in- 
crease will be 1,250,000 souls in each successive 
year. And the approximate proportions of this in- 
crease indicate that every year about 105,665 new 
families were reproduced by the 5,246,334 famihes 
that hire their homes; and about 31,698 by the 
1,624,765 famihes that hire their farms, leaving out 
here the propertied. And the heritage of these 
137,363 newly formed famihes under the condi- 
tions is to be homeless and landless subjects of 
dividogenesure, even as their unfortunate parents 
are. For scarcely any of them could acquire prop- 
erty and thus escape paying rent. 

tFor 1897 is an approximate estimate of The World 
Almanac, 1899, p. 200, foot note. 



164 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

If then we conclude that the one set of the newly 

born families consisted of the tenants of rentable 

homes, while the other of the tenants 

Folf^HousEs ^^ rentable farms, we must admit 

that they paid at least the same 

average rents for homes and farms as their parents 

did. Therefore, the first set per family paid $9.50 

a month as follows : 

Table of the House Rent Paid. 

105,665 families in 7 years paid $ 84,320,670 

105,665 families in 6 years paid 72,274,860 

105,665 families in 5 years paid 60,229,050 

105,665 families in 4 years paid 48,183,240 

105,665 families in 3 years paid 36,137,430 

105,665 families in 2 years paid 24,091,620 

105,665 families in i year paid 12,045,810 

739,655 Total $337,282,680 

Thus the homeless famihes of the year 1891 paid 

the largest amount of the house rents up to the 

end of 1897. Meanwhile the other 

FcmFARMS. yearly additions of the new families 
paid less and less, on account of 
having been younger in age. The number of the 
increased families renting houses, then, was 
739,655, and the total of the rent they paid was 
$337,282,680. 

The increased families of the farming occupa- 
tions, by having paid the average rent of $2.75 per 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 165 

acre, for the average of 136 acres of land per fam- 
ily,* have paid sums as follows : 

Table of Rent Paid for Land : 

31,698 families in 7 years paid $ 82,985,364 

31,698 families in 6 years paid 71,130,312 

31,698 families in 5 years paid 59,275,260 

31,698 families in 4 years paid 47,420,208 

31,698 families in 3 years paid 35^565,156 

31,698 families in 2 years paid 23,710,104 

31,698 families in i year paid 11,855,052 

221,886 Total $331,941,456 

That's what the increase of the homeless and 
landless population means. The newly formed 
families could neither avoid paying the rents in 
favor of the same landed and propertied rich; nor 
could they avoid paying indirect taxes in favor of 
the national government, as we shall soon see. 
And they could not avoid being the slaves of 
dividogenesure, nor of being victims of extortion 
by various trusts and monopolies. In making our 
final conclusion of the profits and losses, the above 
amounts of $669,224,136 worth of paid rents by 
the increased families will be included into the 
previous totals of house and land rents. 

*It might be that some of these families paid house rents 
on farms beside the land rent, as Dr. Spahr has shown; while 
some others might pay simply house rents, and thus oflfset 
each other, making the above sum correct. 



166 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

But, in respect to all farmers' rents and the aver- 
age acreage, it should again be noticed that we have 
dealt only with minimums of their 
RE^N^TED^FAR[irs expenditure in favor of the land mo- 
nopolies. For, ''according to the 
abstract of the eleventh census (p. 97), farms culti- 
vated by their owners increased 9.56 per cent; 
rented farms, 41.04 per cent, and farms rented for 
a share in product,''' 19.65 per cent. In the north 
central division farms cultivated by their owners 
increased less than i per cent, while rented farms 
increased 66 per cent. In the North Atlantic di- 
vision, rented farms increased only 6 per cent, 
while farms cultivated by their owners actually 
diminished. The farmers thus complain that they 
are losing possession of their farms and becom- 
ing tenant farmers. "f 

On p. 112 we have seen the enormous amount of 
indebtedness on the owned farms in the United 
States.J "The percentage of incum- 
INDEBTED «™s. bered farms was, for the United 
States, 47; Kansas, 30; Iowa, 32; 
New Jersey and Mississippi, 34; Nebraska, Dela- 
ware, and South Carohna, 35; South Dakota, 39; 
and at the other extreme, Oklahoma, 95; Utah 
and New Mexico, 85; Arizona and Idaho, 74; 

* "For a share in product" is an initial form of serfdom 
pure and simple. 

t Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 606-7. 
t Also here, p. 125. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 167 

Montana, 73; Maine, 71.'"^ This economic state 
of the farms and farmers continued to exist from 
1890. Consequently there is enough evidence to 
make one sure that thousands of farm mortgagors 
have lost their mortgaged farms by foreclosure, 
and have become merely tenant farmers without 
real property. The increase of the propertyless 
through mortgages may even be greater than 
through the increase of the population, though we 
regard only the latter. 

Seeing also that the ''Principal of Public Debt" 
has increased from $1,549,206,126 in 1890 to 
$2,092,686,024 in 1899,1 it is probable, therefore, 
that the indebtedness of private fam- 
ilies has also greatly increased up to puBifc^D^EBT. 
the end of 1897. Yet, except the 
annual interest charge against the indebtedness in 
force from 1890, neither the increase of the mort- 
gage losses, nor the increase of the gains from 
them, has entered into our accounts, even as the 
great net earnings of the non-national banks, often 
drawing immense profits from mortgages, etc., 
have been totally omitted from our estimate.if. 

If, therefore, there should be any decrease in the 
few unrevised net earnings of the natural monop- 
olies after i890,§ the net earnings of the above 

*Enc. of Soc. Reform, pp. 606-7. 
tWorld Almanac, 1900, p. 174. 
IHere, see foot-note, p. 150. 
§Table of profits, here, p. loi. 



168 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

banks alone would abundantly fill up the loss with 
a great remaining superfluity. Seeing also that the 
cities grow and the population increases, increas- 
ing every business in favor of the same monopolies, 
no one will doubt that our conclusions will be 
moderate, and especially so, because we have failed 
to ascertain the net incomes of several trusts. 

As to the trusts, the American Anti-Trust Jour- 
nal, No. 3, Chicago, says: "Go and talk to the 
thousands of commercial travelers* — those skir- 
mishers on the firing line of commercial indepen- 
dence— -who have been thrown out of employment 
by the trusts. They wiU tell you of hundreds and 
hundreds of business men who have been forced 
out of business within the last four or five years. 
They will tell you how the trusts ordered one man 
after another to close his estabUshment. They will 
give you the names of ambitious and thriving pro- 
prietors who are now clerks or agents of gigantic 
corporate combinations, all hope dead, all oppor- 
tunity gone." Dealing as it does with the trusts of 
still later development, the array of facts in this 
Journal shows that our final conclusions for 1897 
can only be very moderate. 

This being so, and disregarding the crooked 
ways of making profits, let us then make up the 
complete summary of the preceding losses by the 
United States people during the period from 1891 
to 1897 inclusive, as follows: 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 169 
2d Table of the Concentration of Wealth. 



Monopolies and Combinations. 


Total Net Incomes. 


The natural monopolies* 

Mortgagee monopoliesf 

Owners of rentable housesj 

Monopolies of rentable lands §. . . 
Owners of rentable offices, etc., 


$ 4,255,826,950 

3,775,470,286 
5,503,857,212 

4,585,276,226 

3,033,425,468 


Manufacture and mechanical 

♦■f;»r1p>c 


7,812,000,000 




560,000,000 








$29,526,156,142 


National and local taxes paid by 
them*-^ 


3,455,963,952 


The Total Concentration of 
\A/fat th 


$26,070,192,190 

21,787,908,803 


The total increase of national 

■uTf alth 




Excess of net incomes over and 
above the total increase of the 

natinnal "Wfalth 


$ 4,282,283,387 







*Licludes the increase of $310,001,619 by the railroad, tele- 
graph and telephone monopolies, p. 162. 

tExcludes net incomes of the artificial gas companies and 
those of the non-national banks (beside mortgages) as not 
given in the table on p. loi. See foot note, pp. 150, 167, 168. 

Ilncludes the house rent on farms and that of the increased 
population, pp. 149, 164. 

§Includes the rent of land paid by the increased popula- 
tions, p. 165. 

=^'*This amount of double taxes is calculated to have been 
fully paid for 7 years on the net incomes here stated, and 
on all the property these trusts, etc., have had in the be- 
ginning of 1891 and after, according to the tax rates to be 
here indicated, 



170 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

The above table of the net ititcomes shows the 
conclusions that must deeply astonish the thinking 
people. It shows that a ''terrible change has oc- 
curred in the conditions of life in America within 
fifteen or twenty years." But this concentration 
of wealth has taken place within seven years, when 
the national expenditures for wars and the incomes 
of monopolies and trusts started to increase. The 
latter obtained $26,070,192,190. 

Think of this total concentration of the w^ealth 

in seven years ! It is twenty-six thousand seventy 

millions of dollars' worth of wealth. 

oTvik^UH. While the total increase of the na- 
tional wealth, during the same time, 
only amounted to $21,787,908,803, which was en- 
tirely concentrated in the hands of monopolies and 
combinations, together with the additional con- 
centration of yet another amount of $4,282,283,- 
387. This astonishing fact indicates that the net 
income of about one million families in the United 
States has been greater by $ 4,28 2, 28^, ^8 f than the 
total increase of the zvealth collectively produced 
by the nation during the period under considera- 
tion. 

The whole increase of the wealth then has been 
lost in favor of the few. But what does this over 
four billion dollars difiference between the total in- 
crease and the total net incomes of the monopolies 
and combinations mean in view of the situation? 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 171 

Where does this over four bilUon dohars' worth of 
wealth come from? 

This surplus amount of $4,282,283,387 of the 
net incomes certainly cannot mean anything else 
than that the families, unconnected 
with monopolies, trusts, and other '""vmus' wealth^' 
combinations were quickly eating up 
themselves. They not only have absolutely lost all 
that they produced during the time of seven years, 
but have also lost $4,282,283,387 worth of the 
wealth which they owned in 1890. So that the 
aggregate of about $9,260,228,000 worth of 
wealth which was owned by the 11,190,152 "fam- 
ilies worth $5,000 and under"* in that year, must 
have been greatly reduced by monopolies, trusts 
and combinations. There cannot be any doubt, 
too, that hundreds of thousands of the "families 
worth $5,000 and over"* have also suffered from 
the same causes. Hence, the absolute loss of 
$4,282,283,387 worth of the previously owned 
wealth must have been shared by all in favor of 
the very few families whose undoubted prosperity 
has indeed been unusual. For they have concen- 
trated the enormous total of over $26,000,000,000 
worth of the people's wealth in seven years, and 
have thus made the greatly increased population 
much poorer in 1897 than it was in the year 1890. 



^Compare tables, here, on pp. 42 and 47. 



172 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

And this fact of growing poverty has not been 
unsuspected. For, if Mr. W. H. Mallock, in try- 

THE POOR GROW ^"^ ^^ P^^^^ ^^^^ coutrary, admits 
ABSOLUTELY "that the rich" in England "do grow 
richer and the poor grow relatively 
poorer, because their numbers increase, although 
it seems that in the distribution of wealth a 
greater share (of it) falls on their part."t As for 
the United States, it was also said that "since 1873 
the poor have grown relatively, if not absolutely 
poorer."! The method used here for establishing 
this fact leaves no doubt that the rich in both 
countries do grow absolutely richer and the well- 
to-do and the poor in the United States do grow 
relatively and absolutely poorer: accordingly, "the 
largest fortunes" in this country "are increasing 
most rapidly," says Dr. Charles R. Henderson.* 

The reasons why "the largest fortunes are in- 
creasing most rapidly" have already been indi- 
THE REASONS WHY catcd in this and in the preceding 

TesoLUTELr chapters. The most potent of these 
RICHER. reasons are: i. The profoundly un- 
just and abnormal principle of dividogenesure, 
which further and further underrates the value of 
human labor energy and overrates the value of 
mechanical forces in favor of the wealthy. 2. The 



tMr. Mallock's ''Classes and Masses" (1896.) 

$Enc. of Soc. Reform, p. 1392. 

*His work on ''Social Elements," p. 162. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 173 

too high percentages for loans and capital, which 
deprive mortgagors of the fruits of their labor and 
cause the losses of property. 3. Abnormal excess 
of selling prices over cost of production, and low- 
ering prices on raw materials. 4. Different frauds 
and extortions carried on by means of ''watering- 
stock" and so on. All these and other unjustifiable 
means are freely used by monopolies and combina- 
tions against the general well-being of the United 
States people who are constantly robbed and spec- 
ulated upon by a very few members of the nation. 

As an example of the stock-watering by railroad 
monopolies, I introduce here the exact paragraphs 
of Dr. Spahr who, after representing the table of 
figures of stocks and bonds and the cost of rail- 
roads to original investors, says : 

''It should be observed, however, that the sum 
upon which the public is paying interest is not the 
total capitalization of the railroads, 
nor even the stocks and bonds not ^l^u^milT" 
held by other railroads, but rather 
the sum upon which five per cent net is realized 
by the roads. This sum in 1890 was $6,627,000,- 
000.* Not from the standpoint of socialism, but 
from the standpoint of common morality, which 
condemns as robbery both the refusal of the public 
to pay interest upon capital actually lent it, and the 
compelling of the public to pay interest on capital 

^"Statistics of Railways, 1890," p. 58. 



174 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

never lent it, the tzvo thousand and odd millions of 
railroad capital representing no investment^ is 
simply capitalized extortion. 

"But not even the fruits of this extortion have 
gone to the original investors. The expenditures of 

railroads and the dividends they de- 
THE^mGHWAYS. ^^^^^ ^^^^ ht^xi SO largely in the 

hands of loosely controlled directors, 
that railroad construction, railroad purchases, and 
railroad speculation have all served as means to 
divert the property of the stockholders on the out- 
side, into the pockets of the managers on the in- 
side. Nearly all the profits of this extortion from 
the public have passed into the hands of a com- 
paratively few men intrusted with the management 
of the pubHc highways."* These passages simply 
indicate another way of extortion from the public 
of the wealth it creates. 

In addition to these crooked ways of concen- 
trating all that the public has and al] it produces, 

let us examine the amounts of the 
THE TAXES. dircct and indirect taxes paid by the 

wealthy and the poor during the 
same time of seven, years. Upon this subject Dr. 
Spahr speaks as follows : 

tl italicized the words. 

*Dr. Spahr, ibid., pp. 41, 42. The total capitalization of 
railroads in 1890 was represented by $9,437,300,000, while the 
total investment amounted to only $3,714,400,000. And Mr. 
Van Oss stated that "shares now return at least 18 per cent 
per annum on the actual investment." Ibidem. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 



175 



OF INDIRECT 
TAXES. 



"When we consider only the revenues actually 
received by the government the conclusion inevit- 
ably reached is that the wealthy class ^^^ proportions 
pays less than one-tenth of the indi- 
rect taxes, the well-to-do class less 
than one-quarter and the relatively poorer classes 
more than two-thirds. The table summing up the 
incidence of these taxes in 1890 would stand as 
follows : 



Class of Incomes. 


Total Incomes 
in Dollars. 


Total Property 
in Dollars. 


National 

Taxes 
in Dollars. 


Taxation to 


In- 
come. 


Prop- 
erty. 


$5,000 and over. 
$5,000 to $1,200 
Under $1,200.. 


8,110,000,000 

2,890,000,000 
4,800,000,000 


85,500,000,000 

21,500,000,000 

9,000,000,000 


85,000,000 
85,000,000 
260,000,000 


.01 
.08 

.05 


.001 
.004 

.028 



The above table of indirect taxes indicates that 
the poorer classes (including the homeless and 
landless) which had only little over $9,000,000,000 
worth of the aggregate wealth, paid more than 
twice as much of these taxes as did the well-to-do 
and the wealthy classes taken together. Dr. 
Spahr, therefore, adds: 

"In the domain of direct taxation such injustice 
would not be tolerated one month, 
but in the domain of indirect taxa- ^^^^^g p,^^Q 
tion it is endured year after year."* 
So that, enduring similar injustice seven 



*Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 143. The total incomes in the table 
of taxes above represented are gross incomes. 



176 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



years — from 1891 to 1897 inclusive, the increased 
number of families paid the totals of indirect taxes 
approximately as follows: 

Table of Indirect Taxes Paid, 1891-7. 



Classes 
of Famines. 


Number. 


Totals of Property. 


Taxes Paid. 


Families worth 
$5,000 and over. 

Families worth 
under $5,000.. 


1,695,117 
12,755,310 


^79,825,000,000 
7,000,000,000 


$ 840,000,000 
1,479,179,059 



The fact that the total revenue, including- cus- 
toms, etc., received by the government in the seven 
years amounted to $2,319,179,059,! indicates, that 
while the population has increased, the indirect 
taxes seem to have decreased by $340,820,941 be- 
low the amount which would be required by the 
rates paid in 1890. This diminution would average 
about $48,688,705 in each successive year, and may 

THE TAXATION ^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ passagc of the Wilson 
MOST UNJUST TO Bill. Although Dr. Spahr says that 
this bill has not materially changed 
the situation, because the poorer classes, as we see, 
have paid $639,179,057 more for the support of 
the government than did the well-to-do and the 
wealthy classes together. He therefore adds that 
''our system of national taxation remains in pro- 
portion to its weight the most unjust toi poorer 
classes of any now tolerated in any popularly gov- 

tStatistics, World Almanac, 1899, p. 165. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 177 

erned country."* Of course, '^the situation was 
the most unjust," when the families worth $5,000 
and under were smaller in numbers and when they 
owned . over $9,000,000,000 worth of collective 
wealth. But the injustice now surpasses all de- 
grees of comparison, because these families in- 
creased by about 1,565,158, even without counting 
the families worth $5,000 and over whose wealth 
must have been reduced below the worth of $5,000. 
As to the distribution of local taxes in the year 
1890, these were paid as follows : 

TABLE OF LOCAL TAXES PAID. 

Families with incomes of $5,000 and 

over $220,000,000 

Families with incomes of $5,000 to 

$1,200 170,000,000 

Families with incomes of under 

$1,200 125,000,000! 

From this table it is clear that the local taxation 
is not so unjustly imposed upon the 
poorer families as the indirect taxa- ["s^less^ust! 
tion is.t Yet judging from the facts 
that the above table represents gross incomes, 

* Dr. Spahr, "Present Distribution of Wealth in the 
United States," p. 143-4. tib., p. 156-7. 

$"Extra Census Bulletin No. 70" represents taxes on prop- 
erty including corporations for i8go $465,000,000 

Licenses, poll taxes, etc. (about) 50,000,000 

Total (the same as that contained above) $515,000,000 

The Bulletin adds that "three-fourths of this tax falls upon 
the relatively poorer classes." Dr. Spahr, ibid., p. 156. 



178 



THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 



and that the poorer classes lose all the wealth they 
produce in favor of monopolies and combinations, 
the injustice against these classes cannot again be 
regarded other than a profound injustice. For, 
having been paid seven years — from 1891 to 1897 
inclusive — these taxes amount to as follows : 





Table of 


Local Taxes Paid. 


Classes 
of Families. 


Number 
of Families. 


Totals of Property 
in Dollars. 


Taxes Paid in 
Dollars. 


Families worth 
$5,000 and 
over 

Families worth 
under $5,000 


1,695,117 
12,755,310 


^79,825,000,000 
7,000,000,000 


2,615,963,952 

875,000,000 



As to these taxes Dr. Spahr says that "from the 
incomes less than $1,200 less than three per cent 
is taken; from the incomes above $5,000 seven 
per cent is taken. Nevertheless, even these rela- 
tively humane burdens rest twice as heavily upon 
the property of the poorer classes as upon the 
property of the rich. When these local taxes are 
joined with the national, the aggregate tax is one- 

THF TOTAL'? OF ^wclfth of tlic lucomc of cvci'y class. 

TAXES PAID IN There is no exemption of wages. All 
the resourceless individuals,* even 
the absolute slaves of dividogenesure, who divide 
the results of their labor with the wealthy, are com- 
pelled to pay taxes from their wages. And ''the 

*See here, pp. 64, 65, 68, 72. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 179 

wealthiest class is taxed less than one per cent on 
its property," says Dr. C. B. Spahr, "while the 
mass of the people are taxed more than four per 
cent on theirs."! Consequently we see that the 
1,695,117 families whose wealth, at the end of 1897, 
aggregated to $79,325,000,000 v/orth, paid $3,455r 
963,952 of the national and local taxes. While the 
12,755,310 families whose aggregate wealth, at the 
same time, was reduced to about $7,000,000,000 
worth, also paid $2,354,179,059 of these taxes, 
though these families could not have any net in- 
come at all. 

Whatever might be the gross income of the 
12,755,310 increased families under the network of 
imposition spread by the combines, 
they could not have any net income YKs''iN'i89r' 
at all, because at the end of 1897 
these families represented about 63,150,136 indi- 
viduals of a multiple expenditure in every individ- 
ual case. And as these families include about 
7,832,640 propertyless families which represented 
about 38,785,279 homeless individuals, each of 
which in addition to his multiple expenditure, is 
obliged to pay rent for shelter and to pay for per- 
mission to labor, the multiple expenditure of every 
one of these, therefore, surpasses that of each indi- 
vidual of the remainder of the population. 

It would, hov/ever, be wrong to suppose that 

tDr. Spahr, ibid., pp. i57, 158. 



180 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

we had only 7,832,640 propertyless families at the 

end of the period. For beside these families there 

were thousands of the mortgagor 

NOT ALL THE • r o 

PROPERTYLESS families in the begmnmg of 1891 

COUNTED YET. ^^^j^-^j^ j^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^ p-^^^^ ^^ ^^^ 

mortgaged property. And they could not but lose 
the very last under the heavy pressure of the com- 
bines and of the taxation, thus becoming property- 
less, too, though we are unable at present to 
ascertain their number. Yet we may be sure of the 
fact, that the more propertyless famiUes we have, 
the more house and farm rent they must pay to the 
wealthy; and hence the more rapid the concentra- 
tion of the wealth and more extensive slavery of 
dividogenesure must be caused thereby. 

It would also be groundless to think that the 
years 1898 and 1899 have altered the firmly estab- 
lished machinery of concentration of 
AF/ER^isg?. ^^^ national wealth. No, the con- 
centration of wealth in these two 
years has undoubtedly been more rapid than in any 
two previous years. For the trusts, etc., have been 
more active, and have obtained greater net in- 
comes on account of the war than in any two years 
before. While in addition to the 
INCREASED ^lorc rapid concentration of wealth 
bv the combines, the war revenue 
caused a great increase in the rates of the indirect 
taxes, etc. And since "these taxes were imposed by 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 181 

Congress, under the Revenue Act approved June 
13, 1898/' both the propertied and the propertyless 
people continue to pay them up to date as a drain 
additional to the other losses in favor of the wealthy 
few. 

It should also be remembered that, remaining 
unabated, the more rapid concentration of wealth 
and of property rights to-day, pro- increase of the 
duces a still more rapid concentra- ^^^n^ll'IJ.^ZI?'^ 

^ OF WEALTH 

tion of wealth and of rights to-mor- and rights. 
row, because increased and concentrated wealth 
consolidates into interest-bearing property — the 
rate of interest being derived from the growing 
population which by hunger, thirst, and other 
forces is compelled to work for the mighty few. 
And what will be the consequence? 

According to Mr. J. K. Upton, special agent of 
the Eleventh Census, ''the estimated increase of 
wealth from 1880 to 1890 was 49 per cent. A 
proportionate increase from 1890 to 1900 would 
indicate wealth of nearly $100,000,000,000 at the 
beginning of the twentieth century,"* say, at the 
end of 1 90 1. And if the present situation continue, 
it will not be difficult to guess the time when nearly 
the whole nation would consist of desperate slaves 
of dividogenesure, and of about 1,000,000 masters 
distributing places of employment at will — in ac- 



*The World Almanac, 1899, p. 164. Mr. Upton, here, p. 
27. 



183 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

cordance with the highest efficiency and profitable- 
ness of the employed — for the cheapest remunera- 
tion favorable to a few multimilHonaires. 

As exposed in this work, the situation precludes 
the entertaining of any better view, however desir- 
able it may be. For the following estimates of the 
increase of the people prove that the situation has 
even been worse than here represented. 

"PRESENT POPULATION OF THE 
UNITED STATES." 

''According tO' estimates made for the World Al- 
manac by the governors of the States and Terri- 
tories for 1900,"* exclusive of Alaska and the In- 
dian Territory, the "grand total, January i, 1900, 
is 79,354,444 individuals." 

It is quite probable that the average family will 
now be at the most 4.9 members each.f If it is so, 

THE PROPERTY- ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^^°^^ 16,194,581 fam- 

LESS IN 1900 A ilics iu the nation. And, disregard- 

GREAT NATION. -^^^ ^^^-^^ ^j^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^ g^^;^ ^^ 

losing the last pieces of their mortgaged, property, 
we should now have about 8,958,437 families with- 
out real property, which would represent 43,896,- 
342 propertyless individuals of multiple expendi- 
ture in every case. So that, paying monthly rent 

*The World Almanac, 1900, p. 539. 

tThis average would^ mean that in every 100 families 90 
have 5 and 10 have only 4 members. See the decrease of 
family membership: foot note, p. 18. 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 183 

at $9.50 each, these homeless families must pay 
$1,021,261,198 for the year 1900 alone. But if we 
admit the regular increase of the 
farm tenant families, we may now '^be^paid"'" 
have about 1,941,745 of them occu- 
pying rentable lands at the averages of acres and of 
rent previously stated, the total rent of all the ten- 
ants of farms and homes would, therefore, reach 
$1,526,114,903 for one year. And the rent will be 
higher the next year, although nelw rentable houses 
and fiats are built by the speculators every year. 

For, with the active monopolies and combina- 
tions concentrating a greater amount of national 
wealth than the people can produce, h^jpossibility 
the increase of population causes of acquiring 

. PROPERTY 

Utter inability of about 65,000,000 of 
individuals to acquire property.'*' And this very 
inability causes a constant rise in the average land 
and house rent. So that, if some years ago the 
average house rent was $9.50 a month per family 
of nearly 5 members, it may now be above $11 every 
month. The 8,958,437 tenant families would, 
therefore, pay over $1,687,367,389 of farm and 



*"It is interesting to remark that, while in 1893 the num- 
ber of the propertyless families reached over 7-millions, the 
national and local Building and Loan Associations having 
net assets of over $450,000,000, have," in 25 years, "helped to 
secure" only "probably over 400,000 homes," says Mr. 
Wright, U. S. Commissioner of Labor. The World Almanac, 
1899, p. 168; ib., 1900, p. 172. But that inability is aggravated 
by the taxation unjust to the poor. See here, pp. 174-178. 



184 THE IMPENDING CRISIS. 

house rent to the few owners of cities, towns, and 
of lands in one year. 

Thence, the phenomenal net incomes of the om- 
nipotent afford the ample reasons for defending by 
all means in their power the present situation of 
the nation's toiling for the few. 

Finally, as long as the concentration of wealth 
in the private monopolies, trusts and combinations 
not only absorbs all the yearly in- 
'of\?ivi^"only!'^ crease of wealth produced by the na- 
tion, but absorbs the wealth formerly 
owned by the people, it does not make a difference 
whether these combinations raise or lower the high 
prices of utilities which they speculate in upon the 
market, the whole wealth and the entire rights for 
wealth must sooner or later be concentrated in the 
hands of a very few families, because all the means 
of concentration are within their hands. Conse- 
quently, it is not a question whether these all per- 
vading combinations are beneficent or malificent in 
their character, as in either case they work out 
the same evil result. But the question is only a 
question of time : how long before the people with 
all their superior productivity and phenomenal in- 
crease of wealth will have neither wealth nor prop^ 
erty, nor rights, nor sufficient means for existence? 
How long before they all shall in all details be 
absolutely dependent upon the very few specu- 
lators, whose unbounded fortunes the tens of mil- 



CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH. 185 

lions of workers are constantly compelled to in- 
crease? See Appendix II. 

Again, this concentration of wealth can neither 
be hindered by raising the prices of the raw ma- 
terials and products, nor even by the 
raising of wages, nor by lowering the J^eITessary. 
prices of consumable utilities, nor by 
lowering the present rents, because the rate of con- 
centration of wealth now surpasses all degrees of 
change which may be effected by such regulation, 
while the net profits from the nation's energy and 
labor are ultimately derived only by the few, whO' 
are becoming fewer. 

The millions of individuals must therefore free 
themselves from the delusive hopes of some day 
becoming rich; for the strong ten- 
dency, as we have seen, is to deprive ^t^I^ people "^ 
every one of his proper food and of 
the satisfaction of other increasing needs. In or- 
der to become free from the economic bondage and 
slavery of dividogenesure, it is necessary that the 
distribution of wealth should be made to bring 
about more equal results, and that the present 
means of the concentration of wealth should work 
in favor of all the people engaged in the numerous 
spheres of human activity. See Appendix III. 

And it is again to be hoped that the present 
parents in the United States would in nowise hesitate 
to provide some better conditions of life for their 
children in the far and near future, 



APPENDIX, 



Percentages and numbers of families in the 
United States in 1890, under owned and rented 
homes and farms, were represented by Dr. C. B. 
Spahr as follows: 



[Families Identified with Farms 


and 


Homes.] 


Owned: 


Percent. 


Numbers. 


Rented 


Per- 
cent. 


Numbers. 


In cities above 












100,000 popula- 












tion: 












Homes owned. . . 


22.83 


444,879 


Rented: 


77.17 


1,503,955 


In cities from 8,000 












to 100,000: 












Homes owned . . . 


35.96 


629,092 


Rented ; 


64.04 


1,120,487 


Outside such 












cities: 












Homes owned. . . 


43.78 


1,849,700 


Rented: 


56.22 


2,374,860 


Farms owned .... 


65.92 


3,142,746 


Rented : 


34.08 


1,624,433 


Totals and averages 












(for all) owned t 


47.80 


*6,066,417 


Rented: 


52.20 


6,623,735 



t As we have seen on p. 116 that 1,696,670 families out of the 
total of the owning ones* in 1890, were in debt, having their 
properties under mortgage. And only 4,369,747 families out 
of 12,690,152 in the United States were free owners of wealth. 
Compare the above totals with statistical averages on p. 79. 
See Dr. Spahr's "Present Distribution of Wealth in the 
United States," 1896, p. 53. 

187 



188 APPENDIX. 

11. 

DEFINITIONS OF TRUSTS AND MONOPOLIES. 

"A trust," as defined by a committee of the New 
York State Legislature, "is a combination" aiming 
"to destroy competition and to restrain trade 
through the stockholders therein combining with 
other corporations of stockholders to form a joint 
stock company of corporations, in effect renouncing 
the powers of such several corporations, and placing 
all powers in the hands of trustees." The general 
purposes and effects among them are "to control the 
supply of commodities and necessities ; to destroy the 
very possibility of competition ; to regulate the qual- 
ity of all commodities ; and to keep the cost to the 
consumer at prices far beyond their fair and equita- 
ble value.""^ Further, "Trust is" an acting scheme 
"where, by a device of trusteeship, various corpora- 
tions practically form one monopoly without losing 
their separate corporateness. The novel character- 
istic of such a trust is not in its being a mionopoly, 
but the way in which the monopoly is attained."'^ 

Mr. Charles W. Baker in his Monopolies and the 
People, says: 

"A trust is a combination to restrain competition 
among producers, formed by placing the various 
producing properties (mills, factories, etc.) in the 

♦Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1346. 



APPENDIX. 189 

hands of a board of trustees, who are empowered to 
direct the operations of production and sale, as if 
the properties were all under a single ownership and 
management."* 

MONOPOLY IN PRIVATE HANDS. 

''A monopoly in industry may be defined as the 
control of some natural agent, of some line of busi- 
ness, or of some advantage over existing or possible 
competitors, by which greater profits can be secured 
than other competitors can make."t 

All these definitions indicate that the private 
monopolies and combinations have one and the same 
purpose or end in view : It is to find such devices and 
means and to establish such organization of business 
activity, which will enable the organizers and man- 
agers to obtain from the people the greatest profits 
for the least cost, thus concentrating the people's 
wealth in a few hands without paying anything to 
the people in return. 



III. 

On the contrary, a monopoly of the government 
or of municipahty may be defined as a system of 
controlling the natural or artificial agencies of public 
service and utility at such a cost to the public served, 

*Encyclopedia of Social Reform, p. 1346. 
tibid., p. 888. 



190 APPENDIX. 

which will merely cover all expenses necessary (to 
construct and) to keep these agencies in the best 
serviceable and available condition or state, thus 
leaving no room for the unjust concentration of 
the people's wealth in any private hands. 



INDEX. 



Average: rate per cent on debt, 123, 124; average wealth 
of the rich, the well-to-do, the middle, and of the poor 
classes, 28, 29; of over 27-millions, 51, 52; average, for 
homes in debt, 113; for farms in debt, iii, 112; differ- 
ences in averages of different authorities, 38; — rents, see: 
Rent. 

Blocks illustrating comparison of individual wealth, 50. 

Bread-winners by C. D. Wright, 85. 

Capita: per capita wealth, 27, 38; per capita debt, 122, 123. 

Capital: aids to increase production of wealth, 55-57; con- 
centration of capital increased, 140, 155. 

Cities: per cent of the homeless in, 80; cities' families in! 
debt, 114, 115; large cities' families in debt, 114, 115; 
cities belong to 24 and 14 per cent of their population, 
118, 132. 

Comparison of the poor and the rich by dollars' worth, '/, 
8; comparison in tables, 42; of the family-groups, 39; of 
the U. S. with France at the time of Revolution, 16; 
with Rome, 17; by Crosby Hon. Ino. Reciprocal com- 
parison of the middle classes of two tables, 39. 

Concentration: of wealth in higher spheres, 153; of em- 
ployees, 15s, 156; 1st table of concentrated wealth, 150; 
2d and final table of, 169; explanation of this concen- 
tration, 170; concentration of wealth increases, 180, 181; 
concentration of wealth greater than the total increase 
of it, 170, 171. 

Consumers' opinion on rem.uneration of capital and labor- 
ers, 97, 98; do not know the bases of justice and rights, 
98, 99- 

Debt: on farms, iii, 112; on homes, 113; increase of, 1880-89, 
119-122; increase of public debt, 167; total debt on acres 
191 



192 INDEX. 

and lots in 1890, 121, 124-5; percentages of families in 
debt in cities, 114, 115; debt of the U. S., states, counties, 
school districts, etc., foot note, 126; of New York, foot 
note, 134; amounts of, on real estate, 121; per capita, 122; 
extinguished debt, 12.68%, 122; interest charge against 
debt, 124; combined interest charge against families' 
debt, 125, 126. 

Distribution of wealth: ist table, 28; ist R. table, 29; 2d table, 
32; 2d R. table, 36; 2d Right table, 45; ist and 2d tables, 
47. Table I, 6; diagrams for conclusions of Mr. 
Holmes, 5; diagrams for conclusions of Mr. Shearman, 
12; Table II; conclusions of Mr. Shearman, 12; dia- 
grams for conclusions of Dr. Spahr, 20; double table 
III for these diagrams, 21; conclusions of Dr. Spahr, 18; 
conclusions of Geo. K. Holmes, 5, 6. 

Dividogenesure: defintion and origin of, 70; divides people 
into classes, 71; its tacit power of enslaving the people 
or expelling into the sphere of charities, 72; it enforces 
idleness, 73; is the main cause of misery, 74; is sister of 
primogeniture, 74; is a pernicious principle, 74; its fa- 
vorites without moral responsibility, 75; is a system of 
slavery distinct from any other slavery, 75, 'j^i', the prop- 
ertyless are special victims of it, 92, 103-4; is a founda- 
tion of iniquity, 87, 88; implies degrees of hardship 
against its dependents, 117, 74; its hardship according to 
the rates of gain from each employed individual, 103-4; 
its rates are not wages, but pure losses, 106; dififers 
from primogeniture, 131; future of the nation under 
dividogenesure, 106-7. 181. 

Energy: human energy embodied in objects, 98, crystallized 
in articles, 99; human energy concentrates into the hands 
of speculators, 99, 100. 

Extortion: from the public by excess of selling prices over 
cost of production, 158, 159; by mining monopolies, 161; 
by stock- watering, 173, 174, 

Families: groups compared, 39, 42; basis of family-worth, 
39, 41, 42; statistics of — occupying farms and homes, 79, 
— hire farms, 81, — hire homes, 81, 82; farm families in 



INDEX. 193 

debt, III, 112; home-families in debt, 113; table of farm 
and home families, 116; one million of rich families, 92, 
103-4; dividends of the million families, 103, 104 and 
138-9; one million (families) masters, 181-2; 263,380 
families of the well-to-do class included into the average 
of the poor of the 2d table, 32; exposed by comparisons, 
39, 42; surplus million families found in the tenant group, 
2d table, 32, 34, 35. 

Farms: acreage of, 148; rent per acre, 148-9 acreage for the 
increased population, 164-5; rent, 165; increase of rented 
farms, 166; percentage of incumbered farms, 166, 167; 
farms in France, 49. 

Future of the nation (possible), 106-7. 

Gainful pursuits, persons engaged in, 91-2. 

Galileo signed Jesuit Verdict, 16. 

Germany, Berlin, 48, 49. 

Great Britain, distribution of private property, 48, 49. 

Herron, George (Professor dismissed from the Iowa Col- 
lege), 107. 

Holmes, G. K. U. S. Census Expert on Mortgage Statistics, 
6, 14, 15, 24; not partizan, 33, 35. Holmes, G. H., view 
on mortgages, 132. 

House-Scarb defined, 8. 

Income: daily income from the poor, 138-9; gross incomes 
of the workers decreased, 143; net incomes of many trusts 
omitted, 151-2; net incomes of the owners of the cen- 
tral parts of cities, 152-3; net incomes of the manufac- 
ture and mechanical trades, 157-8; net incomes of the 
mining monopolies, 161; total net incomes of the natural, 
mortgagee, rentable house, and land monopolies, 150; 
total net incomes of all monopolies, etc., table, 169; ex- 
cess of the incomes over the total increase of wealth, 
169, 170-1. 

Inventions: as aid to human energy, 85, 86; they are blessing 
and curse, 86; inventors were a blessing to humanity, 98. 

Landowners of England, Scotland, Holland and of Germany, 
56. 

Logical Premises, 5; logical premises of life, 25. 



194 INDEX. 

Losses: special of the wage-earners, 157; special of the farm- 
ers, 160; special of the miners, 161; loss of the previous 
wealth by the people, 171; total loss of wealth in 7 years 
by the U. S. people, 170. 

Mayo Smith, Prof., compares French proprietorship of land 
with that of England, 49. 

Monopolies: definitions of, Appendix II and III; profits of 
the mortgagee, 145; profits of the natural, loi, 145-6; 
profits of monopolies of the rentable homes, 146-7; profits 
of rentable lands, 149; the total net incomes of 4 classes of 
monopolies, 150; grand total of the total net incomes 
of the monopolies and combinations, 169; explanation 
of the net incomes of the monopolies, 170-1. See: In- 
comes, the excess of. 

Mortgages: statistics of, iii; development of, 119; signifi- 
cance of, 128; semi-optimistic views on, 128; view of 
Mr. E. Atkinson on, 128-132; of Mr. G. H. Holmes, 132; 
view of Rev. Wm. D. P. Bliss, Editor of Enc. of Soc. 
Reform, 133; Semi-pessimistic views: view of Mr. J. 
P. Dunn, Jr., Burden of Debt, 134; losses of property 
by foreclosure, an example, 135, 136; view of Mr. D. R. 
Goodloe, 136. See: Debt. 

Mulhall, Mr., comparison of farmers of dififerent countries, 93. 

Napoleon Bonaparte, 107-8. 

Poor: grow absolutely poorer, 172. 

Population: in families, 18; in individuals, 5, 12; increase 
of in 1897, ^^3, 164, 165; in 1900, 182. 

Primogeniture, Great Britain and Japan, 70, 74, 136. 

Productivity of the Americans: on farm, 93; in industry, 94, 
95, 96. 

Propertyless: ''Less than half the nation," 18; "tenants," 
group 1st, 2d table, 32; causes of the increase of the 
propertyless, 52; propertyless is a resourceless man of 
multiple expenditure, 61-68-71; he is a source of multiple 
income for many propertied, 68; without employment, 
69; pay rent or are expelled, 77-78; unseen forces com- 
pel him to be a slave, 76; more — than half the popula- 
tion, 82; made the nation in 1865, 85; could build and 



INDEX. 195 

inhabit 33 most populous cities, 83, 84; have nothing to 
hope for, 86-7; number of in 1897, 179; number of in 
1900, 182. 

Rates of interest are higher against the poor debtors, 127-8. 
See: Debt. 

Real estate indebtedness, 121. See: Debt. 

Rent: house rent per family, 147; house rent on farms, 149; 
rent paid for homes and farms by increased population, 
164-5; average house rent, 147; for farms, 148-9; totals 
of rent paid, table, 169; according to Dr. Spahr for 1890, 
house and office, 152-3; rent for 1900, 182-3-4. 

Resources: of the propertied, 53-60; of the propertyless, 61, 
64-5; a semi-resourced man, 68. 

Rich: comparison of, 42; deeper reasons why the rich grow 
absolutely richer, 172-3. See: Distribution. 

Rome, mistress of the world, 17. 

Shearman, Tho. G., conclusions of, 11, 12, 24, 32; his basis 
of averages differ, 38; one average covers 89.4% of the 
entire population, 40. 

Spahr, C. B., Dr. conclusions of, 18, 20, 24; table, 28, 31. 
See: Taxes. 

Statistics of wealth, by J. K. Upton, special agent of the nth 
census, 27, 181. See: Mortgages, 

Steam power: increase of, 57. 

Taxes: proportions of national taxes, 175; indirect taxes 
paid, 176; decrease of national taxes, 176; unjust to the 
poor, 176; local taxes: proportions of, 176; local taxes 
less unjust to the poor, 177; local taxes paid, 178; the 
poor pay taxes on gross incomes, 179; total taxes paid 
by the rich and the poor, 178, 179; taxes increased by 
the war, 180-1. 

Tenants of farms and homes, 32; the correct number of, 
table, 36. See: Propertyless. 

Trusts: definitions of, Appendix II; development of, 154-156; 
incomes of some trusts omitted, 151-2; trusts more 
active, 180; the view of Henry Brown, Associate Justice 
of the U. S. Supreme Court on trusts, 162. 

Wages: economic doctrine cf the rate of, 141; wages would 



196 INDEX. 

be twice as low, 141; artificially kept up, 142; reports on 
the fall of wages, 142-3. 

Waite, F. C, special agent of the nth census in charge of 
True Wealth: ascertained the earnings of the natural 
monopolies for 1890, 99, loi. 

Wealth: table of, 27; accumulation of, 27; True wealth, 99, 
loi; land is the source of wealth, 54, 55; average wealth 
per family, $5,125, table, 29, 47; per capita, lower table, 
27, 38, table, 51; aggregates of wealth owned by differ- 
ent classes, ist table, 29, 45; wealth owned by individuals, 
table, 51; chart, 50; concentration of wealth, tables, 150, 
169 (for 1897); increase of wealth (for 1900), 181; in- 
crease of in 7 years, 139, 140; increased phenomenally, 
140; who profits by the increase of, 144-5; concentration 
of in industries, 154; largest fortunes of, increase most 
rapidly, Dr. Henderson, 172; wealth reduced with the 
increased number of families, 171. See: in the tax table, 
178. 




PRICE, 35 CENTS 



THE 



IMPENDING CRISIS 



CONDITIONS RESULTING FROM THE 

CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH 

IN THE UNITED STATES 



By BASIL BOUROFF 




PUBLISHERS 

MIDWAY PRESS COMMITTEE 

CHICAGO 



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